This evening, as I poked around in the garden, admiring the smell of freshly washed soil and the sight of rows of carrot and onion seedlings pushing their way upwards, I found I had a number of little visitors.
I had been expecting these caterpillars ever since I saw a cabbage white butterfly inspecting the nasturtiums a week or so ago. She seemed fairly impressed, and sure enough, her offspring were having a jolly good chomp when I found them. One of the reasons I planted the nasturtiums was to keep caterpilllars and blackfly away from my leafy veg, and this seems to have worked.
But there were enough caterpilalrs to completely demolish the nasturtiums, and a splinter group were making headway into some redcurrant leaves as well. So it was time to take them on a little trip. I know my attitude towards some pests might be a little brutal at times, but I actually quite like caterpillars. I used to keep them in jars when I was a child and let them hatch into butterflies. Which is what I’m doing now.
Instead of watching my veg disappear into their greedy jaws, I have moved the little creatures into their own hotels. These are simply empty coffee jars containing plenty of nasturtium leaves and covered in hessian to maintain good airflow. All I need to do now is top the jar up with nasturtium leaves every so often, and move it into the shed when rain threatens.
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