Pests & diseases › Cabbage Worms
Cabbage Worms
Velvety green caterpillars (imported cabbageworm) that strip brassicas. Adults are the white butterflies you see fluttering around cabbages.
Symptoms
- Velvety green caterpillars on brassica leaves
- Ragged holes through leaves
- Green frass wedged in cabbage hearts
- Whole plants stripped to skeletons
Lifecycle
Multiple generations spring through fall.
What to do
- Hand pick — drop into soapy water
- Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt) spray — caterpillar-specific bio-control
- Spinosad
- Encourage parasitic wasps with flowering herbs (dill, fennel)
If it's bad
- Pyrethrin
Stop it coming back
- Floating row cover from transplant onward
- Decoy white butterflies (eggshells on canes) — territorial behavior keeps real butterflies out
Crops it goes for
Plan the plot, track every sowing, cook the harvest
Sowing reminders and harvest forecasts for your own frost dates, the Seed Tin, Scan Centre for any label or packet, and the Potty Mouth Garden Club. Free to start.