I need to cover my plants with a net as they are getting nibbled by pigeons. Other plots have netting covers supported with a thick blue rubber looking pipe, fellow growers have told me you get it from hardware stores...BUT i can't find it I don't know what it is really used for or what to ask for. Can anyone help?
It's water pipe - the sort water companies and builders use. Most of us don't BUY it! You can get it in skips, off building sites, on Freecycle. But if you really have to buy it, Wickes sell it in the plumbing section.
thanks ceres. I think I'll have to buy some and be quick about it, I'm not sure if it's too late for some of my sprouting broccoli, the outside leaves are badly damaged but there looks like there is some new leaves to the centre of the plant shall i pull them out and start again or leave them and hope for the best?
If the growing tips are still there, they should recover fine but you'll have to be quick protecting them. Do you have no milk bottles or soft drink bottles (large 2L size) t hat you can use as a temporary measure? Cut the bottoms off and carefully push them into the soil around the plant.
dont forget the same applies to the rest of your brassicas (cauli,cabbage etc) all need to be covered from the blinking flying rats. if the worst happens,i dont think it would be too late to start some more off
Netting is very light weight
You can support it with canes Just put yoghurt pots or plastic bottles on top with a tiny tack or blue tack to keep them in place to make a frame.
So long as you cover the top of the greens with some sort of netting.
The birds do not like to be somewhere where they can not take off, so you do not need to completely cover the sides
A lot of netting can be held in place with clothes pegs on the canes, it is quicker on a windy day. Then tie it on, with string, once the netting is in place and take off the clothes pegs
I do use netting but also have a large rubber snake (Monty the python) which seems to work quite well if I run out of time and don't get the netting up straight away. I've just bought him a mate (Hissing Syd) from a car boot sale to improve the defences on the plot. We originally bought Monty to keep the starlings from nesting in our roof which worked a treat too. You do need to move them around every couple of days or the birds work out that they are in no danger.
If I thought snakes would deter our blooming jumbo sized pigeons, I'd fill my plot with cobras............ ;)
Down here we find a 12 bore works very well and adds protein to the dinner plate... ;D
It's called MDPE Alkathene Pipe.