I took out my front lawn dwarf box hedging yesterday and today had a go at digging out two of the box balls planted at the start of the hedges. Not an easy job to do at all, 2 down, 38 to go! Might have to re-think what I'm going to do with the stumps.
I'm gutted to find that two of my taller box plants, one 7ft tall in the middle of a mixed hedge and one lovely cream variegated one ditto which shields the neighbours from me when I'm using the compost bins have now both been attacked. I was hoping that as they were taller and in more sheltered spots they might be spared.
Hope you're okay @madpenguin, just the kind of thing I'm prone to do. I was using an axe today so was doubly careful!
Yes, I'm not surprised though. I think I first saw it on my plants last year but it didn't seem to get much worse this year and I thought the fortnight we had with very hard frosts earlier in the spring had killed the blighters off. It's only in the last month it's got a lot worse - the heatwave perhaps?
I am definitely getting the worst affected ones out at some point, at the moment the green waste bin is full to the brim and l have 2 large trugs of green waste waiting for space as the compost bins are full. Every time l go out in the garden l see more areas of damage. I just can't see the point in trying to fight it tbh. These caterpillars seem to be covering the country at a fair old rate ☹.
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I'm gutted to find that two of my taller box plants, one 7ft tall in the middle of a mixed hedge and one lovely cream variegated one ditto which shields the neighbours from me when I'm using the compost bins have now both been attacked. I was hoping that as they were taller and in more sheltered spots they might be spared.
Hope you're okay @madpenguin, just the kind of thing I'm prone to do. I was using an axe today so was doubly careful!
Every time l go out in the garden l see more areas of damage. I just can't see the point in trying to fight it tbh. These caterpillars seem to be covering the country at a fair old rate ☹.