[simon hughes]

I netted my brassica bed like a good boy but the debris netting is no match to the butterflies. They find a way in. At first I just removed the eggs and any small green catepillers I found. The damage was minimal. Now they got bigger and I've removed 20 or so almost 20cm long this morning. The holes are getting bigger
Mainly on my savoy cabbages, the red ones aren't so bad. But will these make it?

Also whilst I've been cleaning all the little yellow eggs I've now noticed clusters of much bigger dark green eggs at the bottom of the heart. Is this a different type of butterfly. I've been spraying them and they mostly disperse but it's hard to get at them.

Ta!

[sunshineband]

Yes they will recover as they carry on growing new leaves right through until after butterflies are no longer around.. Sounds like you have been doing a good job keeping them down tbh

Regarding the dark green "eggs" further down: this is probably caterpillar frass (droppings) and squirting it away is the best thing to do, which you are

These butterflies ca be abimmin' nuisance can't they? I have resorted to superfine mesh, as they can't poke their pointy little bottoms through it to lay eggs on leaves

[Goosegirl]

t's also good to have a space between the netting and the leaves so they can't lay their eggs.

[simon hughes]

Yes they will recover as they carry on growing new leaves right through until after butterflies are no longer around.. Sounds like you have been doing a good job keeping them down tbh

Regarding the dark green "eggs" further down: this is probably caterpillar frass (droppings) and squirting it away is the best thing to do, which you are

These butterflies ca be abimmin' nuisance can't they? I have resorted to superfine mesh, as they can't poke their pointy little bottoms through it to lay eggs on leaves

How long till the butterflies go away? Never looked forward to winter so much

[sunshineband]

End of September they usually stop laying eggs here, but on a hot year into October I'm sorry to say 

[Ethel]

I've just pulled up all my summer broccoli today - it was looking so grotty and a lot of it had gone to seed when we had the hot weather and I rather neglected my brassicas. It had been attacked by caterpillars, despite the debris netting, and loads of whitefly. I'm going to put some cavalo nero plants in instead but I was wondering if it would be ok with regular garden netting with bigger holes in? Or even wire mesh like you'd have on a rabbit's run? I'm not sure the netting kept out anything but birds and it would look a lot nicer with something less heavy over it. And would marigolds help deter the whitefly? My grandad used to plant them with his brassicas and I was wondering if there was a good reason for this. Thanks in advance.