Topic: bugger those caterpillars

[littlegem]

Have only just looked closely at my brassicas and there are hundreds of caterpillars and eggs!!! not noticed them before!!! there are too many to pick off by hand! i've read about the potato leaf stew. has anyone tried potato leaf and garlic stew, i'm gonna try that. question is, how long do i boil for and what sort of concentration do i need and how do i apply? do i use a watering can, cos there is too many to use a spray pot. i've also heard about rhubarb leaves, but dont have any. any suggestions for any other mixtures (strong ones) without use of chemicals?

[Icyberjunkie]

SOrry, I can;t help.  As you can see from my parnsip posting I chickened out and used derris dust which is organic and you can by the same as a liquid spray.

[Icyberjunkie]

Thats a good tip Wardy - will try that next year.

[littlegem]

icyberjunkie, hello again! someone mentioned dust to me today at work, never heard of it, where do i get it? yesterday i boiled up some potato stems and leaves, garlic, onion and peppercorns and covered the little buggers with my watering can then this morning i checked and was still loads left, so i blasted them with my hosepipe hoping they'd fall on floor and DIE over my mixture. looks like i still need help though. next year gonna do raised beds! and fleece and nets and companian planting and everything else thats going!!!!!

[TEL]

You can get derris dust from most gardencenters.

[nitiram]

I've been spraying mine with the old fashioned soapy water mix and hand picking the blighters. Have also adorned them with some old net curtains to try and deflect the butterflies. Will see how many caterpillars I have today. Daft question...but will the buterflies disappear with the cold weather leaving the brassicas to grow on undisturbed?

[redimp]

I find that at this time of year wasps deal with all my caterpillars.  I have problems with them earlier in the season but it gets to the stage where I am picking them off and there is the odd wasp hanging around, I then leave them.  Next time - no caterpillars.  I have watched wasps in action twice on caterpillars on nasturtian in the garden - it is quite and awesome sight.  Wasps have been my friends ever since.

[tim]

If you can dust them, both sides of the leaves, you can brush them off? Worst year ever, here. Didn't keep the fleece on.

Wasps? We don't have any this year.  Whites? Yes, they'll go. Please God!!

[Robert_Brenchley]

I always have wasps about since I have bees. The first year I had them, I watched wasps pouncing on bees, admittedly mostly the worn out ones crawling about on the ground, biting them in half, and going off with the juicy back half while the front was still crawling about looking puzzled. Sometimes they'd bite off the wings and legs, and fly off with the lot, which was bigger than the wasp. After that I did some thinking and came up with a way of keeping wasps out of hives. I still have a few, but not so many, and it's never become a problem since. I've known other people have hives completely wiped out by wasps. Apart from that, I like them, as they do deal with so many insect nasties.

[daisymay]

I never knew that wasps ate bees and other insects! don't know what I thought they ate!

there has not been many wasps around where we are this year (not that I am complaining!)

[Icyberjunkie]

icyberjunkie, hello again! someone mentioned dust to me today at work, never heard of it, where do i get it?

Sorry for not coming back sooner littlegem!  Tel is correct though in that you can buy derris dust at most garden centres - I got mine from a Wyevale.  You can also buy it in liquid form but take note of the approved applications.

If using dust for caterpillat you need to make sure you hit the caterpillars so do both sides of the leaf and take note of the wind direction for it will drift freely.  No harm to other plants but probably not to healthy to inhale in excess!

Iain

[Robert_Brenchley]

Wasps kill other insects by the thousand to feed the larvae, which are carnivorous. The larvae respond by producing a sugary solution to feed the adults. When the queens top laying in late summer, the adults get hungry, and that's when they start coming into kitchens etc. looking for anything sweet.

[Jesse]

My brassicas were netted and still some managed to get in. I couldn't stand squishing them so picked them off and threw them onto the compost heap with a few cabbage leaves, hoping they'll stay there and don't head back towards my brassica patch. They're also covered in whitefly which I'm hoping won't do too much harm.

[tim]

So you all think that you're hard done by?? That was our sprouting!!

[redimp]

I have some sprouts that look like that - not caterpillars though but slugs which seem to love it everytime I protect something with fleece.  My sprouts are recovering - are you expecting your PS to recover or are they now right offs - I hope the former.

[Jesse]

Did you have them covered at all Tim?

[Icyberjunkie]

Crikey thats awful Tim!   How long did that take?    The only thing I have looking like that is Ligularia in the garden and that was slugs as well.

[redimp]

My Romanescu is stubbornly avoiding forming anything whereas some of my purple sprouting is sprouting away - it's a topsy turvy world. ???

[Diana]

Tim, that looks just like my PSB...and my sprouts, kale, kohl rabi, caulis... :'(

I'm meshing everything next year - including the rabbits if I catch the blighters

[Doris_Pinks]

Meshed my Brussels up tight, so tight that I now can't pick of the blinkin catterpillars that have somehow managed to break through my lines of defence!