Cabbage hoop house ( photo / image / picture from carolyn keiper's Garden ) We covered our cabbage today in hopes of keeping the cabbage loopers off of it so we don't have to spray it. we took rebar and pounded it in for stakes. Then we cut 20' sections of pvc to 13' and put the ends over the rebar. took a roll of row cover and covered all the cabbage and cauliflower, pinned down the edges and now we have a $60.00 hoop house to protect the 75 plants underneath and we can reuse it for many years to come. the initial cost seemed like a lot, but using it for years spreads the investment to a manageable amount of dollars
Carolyn, how wide are your rows? $60 doesn't sound bad to me. I've got to get something like that put together before the fall. I've had good luck with BT for cabbage lopers, but then I don't have to get out and spray 75 cabbage plants. My goodness.
That looks very good, Carolyn. You are going to get some good service (and crops) for many years to come with that tent. Yes....nice work indeed.
O.K. City slicker question: What is cabbage looper? A bug I guess. Nice use of materials, clever. Jerry
These are the devil spawn of the cabbage moth. They look like a harmless green catapillar. Don't be fooled, they eat their weight several times a day in cole crops. I use dipel dust to destroy the vile beasts. These, bindweed, creeping charlie, and Japanese Beetle (jewel bugs) are the bane of all gardeners.
FBG, I would give you 2 seeds for that comment if I could. Pricklypear the row is about 8'-9' wide. We recycle the plastic from the neighbors white silage bag and plant 3 plants wide in it. Jerry, those pretty little white butterflies/moths you see floating around your lawn are actually a horrible problem for the cabbage family. they lay their little eggs that hatch into little larvae that will destroy your cole crops in no time at all. they make little worms in the broccoli and no one wants to eat them, because you don't always see them when you clean it to eat for supper. after you steam it, all the nasty little worms have turned white and are very evident on your dinner plate. OR.... people have sprayed with insecticides and you eat that instead.
