Allan Balliett wrote:
> I shed the most tears for the pounds of cabbage loopers that cycle > unharvested through my brassicas each year. I've never eaten one, not > even the ocassional one that floats on top of the broccoli steaming > water. Hi! Allan, I assume the cabbage loopers are the grub of the White Cabbage Butterfly. They are susceptible to a "crush" or "Ferment" Pepper. I had them very bad one time and was going to ferment them and spray the area. I collected fifty odd and took them to the house, intending to set up a fermentation and crushed them while having a cup of tea. I just used the back of a tea spoon in the grove of a dinner plate. This produced a streaky green liquid with a small amount of more solid parts. I had a new, three dollar "Trigger Pak", so poured the more fluid part into it and diluted it in a couple of hundred mills of rain water. I percussed it a hundred times and went to the garden where there were over two hundred Brassicas, all with thirty to fifty loopers. I walked around and sprayed a little most plants and in the atmosphere in the whole of the garden. There were several hundred adult white cabbage butterflies in the area. The next day only a handful of butterflies and noticeable fewer loopers. In five days only a few odd loopers in the whole garden and just two butterflies..... In following years, we usually only see a few and if in any numbers we repeat the above. If you can't bring your self to eat them, send them to the neighbours....
