Hi Berhill. Thanks for the suggestion, but 'fraid I'm not a chemicals guy. I don't like to upset natures, although sometimes slightly laggy, balance. The cardinal beetles, lady birds and hover flies have been doing sterling work on my aphid and flee beatle problems :-)
I've put all the brassicas from my frame in the council recycling bin - my poor swedes, cabbages and caulis :-(, however didn't feel it's worth taking the risk. I now need to decide if there is any further action I need to take. I'm trying work out where the weevils may have ventured to in and around my frame and on my non-brassicas, and for how long they may stay there. I'm assuming a lack of their favoured food will mean that they can only survive for so long. The cold-frame is lined with gravel that sits on a concrete drive, so other than some of the other, non-brassica, pots in the frame, I can't see them having set themselves up to be a future problem. I'd really appreciate other people's thoughts on this. Having had a bad case of spider mites on my 7 aubergine plants this year (brought in from a plant bought at a local fair) I'm nervous about another large scale pest emergency :-)
Many thanks!
Kind regards
ps. I have to say that the pests seem to have the upper hand this year. I've also had asparagus beetle, asparagus miner, celery leaf miner, aphids (shepherded by their best friends the ants), flea beetle, cabbage aphid, lilly beetles, viburnum beetle (smell-inducing things!) black-birds eating my fig leaves and the other usual suspects. It's all good learning, eh! :-)
Looks like I've an infestation of newly hatched adults. Fortunately, they won't breed this season, and thus I can concentrate on getting rid of any that are there before they overwinter and not having to worry about. I'm thinking of keeping brassicas away from the cold-frame for the time-being, performing lots of good-hygene measures in there - perhaps cleaning it out with some boiling water. And perhaps setting up a pheromone trap to catch any stragglers. Again, any advice/comments(good or bad :-) ) would be hugely valued.
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I've put all the brassicas from my frame in the council recycling bin - my poor swedes, cabbages and caulis :-(, however didn't feel it's worth taking the risk. I now need to decide if there is any further action I need to take. I'm trying work out where the weevils may have ventured to in and around my frame and on my non-brassicas, and for how long they may stay there. I'm assuming a lack of their favoured food will mean that they can only survive for so long. The cold-frame is lined with gravel that sits on a concrete drive, so other than some of the other, non-brassica, pots in the frame, I can't see them having set themselves up to be a future problem. I'd really appreciate other people's thoughts on this. Having had a bad case of spider mites on my 7 aubergine plants this year (brought in from a plant bought at a local fair) I'm nervous about another large scale pest emergency :-)
Many thanks!
Kind regards
ps. I have to say that the pests seem to have the upper hand this year. I've also had asparagus beetle, asparagus miner, celery leaf miner, aphids (shepherded by their best friends the ants), flea beetle, cabbage aphid, lilly beetles, viburnum beetle (smell-inducing things!) black-birds eating my fig leaves and the other usual suspects. It's all good learning, eh! :-)
I found this useful information on the pest:
https://www.ages.at/en/topics/harmful-organisms/cabbage-stem-weevil/tab/1/
Looks like I've an infestation of newly hatched adults. Fortunately, they won't breed this season, and thus I can concentrate on getting rid of any that are there before they overwinter and not having to worry about. I'm thinking of keeping brassicas away from the cold-frame for the time-being, performing lots of good-hygene measures in there - perhaps cleaning it out with some boiling water. And perhaps setting up a pheromone trap to catch any stragglers. Again, any advice/comments(good or bad :-) ) would be hugely valued.
Kind regards