Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: shokkyy on May 19, 2013, 18:47
-
I've got a piece of ground about 3.5 M X 3.5 M that I wanted to use for brassicas so need to net. I reckon you'd need about 6 M X 6 M once you've allowed for height and a bit for pegging down, but it seems to be really unusual for either netting or fleece to be sold in bigger widths. The standard packs all seem to be pretty narrow, and I've always had the same problem with fleece as well.
When I had a look, I discovered the Veggiemesh people sell netting in a 5.6 M width, which should just about be big enough, but only just. Price doesn't seem too bad though, at 38.99 for a 6 M length. Anybody bought Veggiemesh? Were you happy with it?
-
Buy a 100mt roll of debris netting off fleabay. it comes in 2 or 3mt widths but is easy to cable tie 2 strip's together.
-
I just looked, and a 3M X 50M roll is the same price as the Veggiemesh I looked at. The only cheaper I could see was 3M X 20M and black, and I'm not so sure I'd want to use black netting because of the amount of shade it would cast.
-
But the veggie mesh is only 6mt long.
-
Yes, but I only want 6 M long :)
-
If it is 3.5 m by 3.5 you are going to struggle to get into the middle of the bed to weed etc. Have you thought of two narrower beds - it will be easier to get netting to cover that way.
-
you are going to struggle to get into the middle of the bed to weed etc.
It's easy - just walk on a board, not everybody uses a bed system ;)
-
Yes, splitting the area might help, though that would mean I'd end up with a few netted rows next to each other, which would be a lot of pegs and canes and stuff to work around.
When I was browsing around last night, I was sorely tempted by the veggie cages sold by the same company that do Veggiemesh. The netting drove me insane last year, and that was in a long strip rather than a big block. I tried using canes for supports and I tried using waterpipe hoops, and neither was solid or stable enough. Every time I lifted the netting to weed or feed or anything else, the canes/hoops kept collapsing. It would be very nice to have a proper cage that was more solid and stable.
-
Gardening Naturally's butterfly netting works well, and it helps to be able to see through it. It comes in all different widths, including 6m. Just checked the price and it would cost you about £27.00
I tried putting a link in but it didn't work.
-
Yep, thanks. I'm actually growing in my garden rather than an allotment, so I don't tend to have a lot of problems with pests and disease, just the cabbage whites, so hopefully that'll do the job.
In the end I succumbed to temptation and ordered the veggie cage with butterfly mesh, comes complete with all the pegs and everything you need. Fingers crossed it'll be a lot more stable and there'll be less swearing when I'm trying to do weeding and feeding stuff with my brassicas this year :)
-
Just an update to say that the cage arrived very quickly and was very easy to assemble, and I really, really wish I'd ordered one of these before. Its' so much better than the canes and stuff I was struggling with before. I went for the biggest height because some of the brussels and kale and stuff can get pretty tall, and I can get around in there very easily, without having to go on hands and knees. I like the butterfly netting too, much softer than enviromesh and easier to work with. Whereas before I was neglecting weeding and feeding because it was just so much hassle to do, now it's no trouble at all to just unpeg the entrance and walk in, albeit a bit stooped :)