Netting for a new fruit cage

[Babru]

Last autumn we bought a little polytunnel much reduced in price. The plastic cover looked like it would only last a few months, but the frame is sturdy and I really want a fruit cage. We're using it as a polytunnel till the cover goes (all my 'spare' tomatoes in there, dwarf beans etc).

However we're thinking about what type of netting we should use to make it into a raspberry fruit cage. OH is thinking chicken wire, as it's sturdy. Any suggestions?

[burnie]

Most chicken wire has quite large holes and small birds can still get through it.

[Mr Bones]

Smaller mesh wire is available which should still allow pollinators through

Just tried to paste a link to 13mm mesh.. ha it was one enormous string of a link so I removed it

Try again

[Mr Bones]

Link above no longer works without the ad text..

[RedRuth]

Smaller mesh wire is available which should still allow pollinators through

Just tried to paste a link to 13mm mesh.. ha it was one enormous string of a link so I removed it

Try again

Try tiny url to shorten the link https://tinyurl.com/

[RedRuth]

The problem with using chicken wire or bird netting is it will still allow the Raspberry Beetle in, this is a problem for summer fruiting Raspberries - at least it is in the south West where my allotment is. I've never had a problem with birds eating the Raspberries, everything else but not Raspberries!

[littlemoney]

My experience is that birds seems to like summer raspberries but don't take as many autumn raspberries. I don't know why. Perhaps there are more fruits available at the same time.

[annie8]

I don’t lose much if any raspberry fruit. So don’t cover them. We have just built a cage for my strawberries though using chicken wire. Waiting to see if it works. Used the stuff with pretty small holes to stop the pigeons and squirrels.

[annie8]

I don’t lose much if any raspberry fruit. So don’t cover them. We have just built a cage for my strawberries though using chicken wire. Waiting to see if it works. Used the stuff with pretty small holes to stop the pigeons and squirrels.

[Babru]

Thanks for the 13mm suggestion, I've had a look online and it's not expensive. Interesting that your raspberries are untouched annie8. My friend with the allotment in Edinburgh says she has to net hers. We have a lot of very friendly blackbirds, who we feed all year. I had imagined they would be eying up the raspberries, as they just love fruit.

[nickdub]

I find, living as I have on the edge of woodland for the last 40 years, that birds vary a little from year to year in what they decide to eat, but there's a definite order of preference re soft fruit, top :- blackcurrants + strawberries - red currants - ripe gooseberries but not unripe ones - raspberries - Josta berries - loganberries - with Tayberries being bottom. (I've just started growing blueberries, so no good info on their place in the packing order yet)

The break point in this list for me is the raspberry - sometimes the birds will eat them sometimes not, but as the deer eat most of the unprotected canes before they flower, that is of not much help to me :-) (have another

[annie8]

Interesting. Well if the bird do get some of the rasps it isn’t enough for me to notice. We do have a pair of blackbirds that visit the garden maybe they are too busy eating the berries on the mahonia which they love.

[peanut]

I find that the birds, mainly Blackbirds will take the first of everything but then move on as soon as the next fruit is ready. I only lose a negligble amount of the early Raspberries then they move on to the Red/white currants, which they really love, then Blueberries, then Blackberries, they don't seem to come back round for second fruitings (fruitings is my own word) of anything oddly.