Keeping insects off brassicas

[mogs]

Apart from the chemicals you can buy, is there a natural way of keeping insects off of the brassicas?  I know that you can buy the fleecy stuff, but I wondered if there is another cheaper possibility.

[Russethouse]

mogs, I am not being funny, but you could google 'keeping insects off brassicas', some of the answers I came up with quickly were: covering with fleece as you mention, planting through aluminium foil, filling yellow pans with water and planting aromatic plants nearby.

There is quite a lot of info there.....the RHS site also may be worth exploring

 

[tracteurtom]

I'd be interested to hear what you come up with. 

Its very important to follow a crop rotation programme Yr 1  manure and Pots; Yr 2 Compost and legumes;  Yr 3 Brassicas;  Yr 4 Roots and Yr5 rest.   IMO Insecticide is a must for brassicas and is the only sure answer.  You need to spray spray and spray.  Brassicas are very suspectible to insect attack and it can ruin the crop very quickly.  I keep a spray ready mixed to hand and use as required.

[newbiee]

If you're growing brassicas you must net them, or the pigeons will get there first and they'll strip the plants before you get a look in.

[mogs]

We have tons of birds, some very pretty ones but so far I've not seen one pigeon in the garden.  Plenty of magpies, I suppose they probably do the same damage.

Thanks for your helpful advice.    I did google beforehand RH, but thought I'd ask some of the forum experts what they thought too, the gardening section is usually very informative. Sorry if you felt I was asking a stupid question.

 

[Russethouse]

Not at all mogs, I fancy the 'aromatic companion planting' myself but have never tried it...