Brassica Massacre!!

[Likac66]

Aargh! Came home from holiday to discover my brassicas have been massacred by butterflies. Well, their caterpillars anyway. I think the sprouts will be ok as they are so well established but some of my cabbages and calabrese looks devastated. Also I planted a couple of nero kale plants before we went away but obviously the netting didn't hold well and the pigeons have stripped those to the bone.

Waaah!

They were netted, but obviously not well enough. I think where stuff has grown taller it is has pulled the netting up and around.

I am now looking at getting a proper vegetable cage with butterfly netting and buying some established plants to go in. I love brassicas so have a big area of my plot so it will be a bit of an investment but I am not giving up.

[lottie dolly]

whoops,that was not a nice greeting home,was it,what were doing is,building a permenant wooden cage's,covered with debri netting,all holes machined up,the first one stands aprox 5.5 feet high,just nice for me,got more to do as space is vacant,when the crop is rotated,other things can be grow in them,if need be,just leave the door off,when i go down again,i will take some pics,and put in the apropriate thread,

[Bren In Pots]

Likac66 like LD says debris netting is good but even with I cage I check my brassicas for caterpillars because butterflies seem to squat and drop their eggs.

[Likac66]

I had debris netting over part of it, but it wasn't big enough to cover the lot. I had some other netting kind of joined to it but it clearly wasn't good enough. Well, it's all a learning curve isn't it? I know now to be much more disciplined about it!

Just wondering what else I can still sow now. Will have to look through my seed packets but I want to buy some plants as well so I've got some stuff earlier.

[lottie dolly]

take some outer leaves of,to see how far they have gone into the cabbages,quite often the heart is fine,smaller,but not all lost,
BIP,they little blighter eh,we got lots of the things,they seem to gather mostly on the flowers form seeded radish,

[WPG]

Sorry to hear your plight Likac (I love the phrase Brassica Massacre!)

I've splashed out on a huge roll of environmesh for next year...rather expensive but it's a last resort. Used a variety of netting this year and it was all useless against the cabbage white. Every time I arrived at the plot there would be at least a couple of them happily fluttering around inside the nets, grrrr! I was a bit squeamish about squashing eggs at the start of the season, but am now a fully fledged caterpillar-killer.........

[bazzaboy]

Sympathies, Likac, very annoying when this happens. One answer if you've room and with a bit of outlay (but not expensive for what you get) is the much advertised Wonderwall
Walk in Wonderwall

There was an earlier discussion about its cost, use, effectiveness etc, see
http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...derwall-2.html

I just wish it wasn't quite such a lurid green so I still use "build a ball" which is 100% effective against butterflies with the right gauge netting (joints better if reinforced with tape as wind-rock works them loose). But you still get slug attack of course. And low netting is a pain when it comes to weeding etc so a year+ on I'm still pondering getting a Wonderwall and subjecting allotment neighbours to lurid green....

Even "low netting" or wire mesh needs to be a minimum of several centimeters/inches clear of the crop. Cabbage White butterflies evidently sense the appropriateness of a crop for their offspring via their FEET so if they can touch the crop you've got trouble, pigeons will happily use wire mesh as a convenient perch and peck anything they can reach through the mesh....

And meantime slugs and other nasties come up from under the soil.....

Yup, it's a battle to grow a decent cabbage, good luck!

[crannman]

thinking of one of them wonderwall things myself ideal xmas present (sorry but its not for to xmas )

[Stan79]

What do commercial growers do? Spray with pesticides? What about suppliers of organic brassicas?

[WilliamD]

Commiserations Likac66. If these Caterpillar Nematodes are anything like as good as the slug ones (in my experience) they'll do the trick. We've just ordered some.

Like lottie dolly suggests, the heart of the cabbage is often absolutely fine - my humble entry in the brassica section of this year's showcase had had it's outer leaves chewed. And last night there was a caterpillar in the folds of a spring onion here. Seems they'll go for anything!

[WilliamD]

Hmm .. just noticed you've got to find the blighters and spray them directly. Miss one and it'll survive. :-(

[Bren In Pots]

I just wish it wasn't quite such a lurid green so I still use "build a ball" which is 100% effective against butterflies with the right gauge netting (joints better if reinforced with tape as wind-rock works them loose). But you still get slug attack of course. And low netting is a pain when it comes to weeding etc so a year+ on I'm still pondering getting a Wonderwall and subjecting allotment neighbours to lurid green....

I bought black debris netting for my cage it does seem to blend in better. here's a photo of it before I'd planted my brassicas.

[Martin H]

Like lottie dolly suggests, the heart of the cabbage is often absolutely fine

I think a lot depends on what kind of caterpillars they are.

The black and yellow ones of the Large White seem to hang around in gangs on the outer leaves and don't bother going further in until after they've eaten them all. But the green caterpillars of the Small White don't like to socialize and often burrow into the middle of the cabbage and hide there out of sight.

[Penellype]

I've just ordered some vine weevil nematodes and some slug ones, but I didn't realize they did caterpillar ones. On the shopping list for next time!

I've had my share of butterfly caterpillars this year but the really really destructive one has been this one:



This is the cabbage looper, which is a moth caterpillar. It has completely destroyed crops of carrots and peas, eaten holes in the potato and strawberry leaves, and even munched its way through most of the rhubarb. The only things it hasn't yet attacked are the tomatoes, courgettes and, surprisingly, the kohl rabi (not that there was much left after the butterflies got at it).

I have an environmesh net over my cabbages, but this morning I found a large cabbage moth caterpillar (brown with a yellow stripe) inside the net

Watch out, caterpillars, the nematodes are coming!

[Likac66]

Hmmm... thanks all. The wonder wall thing looks good but a bit expensive. Might go for something more like this:

Vegetable Cages for Brassica