Kitchen Garden Forum

I don't know if it's something we're doing (or not doing) but most of our brassicas seem to get whitefly at different times of the year.

Can anyone advise:
- Do they cause much actual harm, or are they just unsightly but nothing to be worried about?
- What would you recommend to avoid them?

A few probably don't do too much harm, if they are under enviromesh then the predators can't get to them, there is an organic soapy spray you can use,

Living in a whitefly-free area ( ) all I can say is

i) A lot of wives don't like them
ii) Their honeydew does lead to mould
iii) They don't seem to have any effective predators

The above based on experience when I did live in a whitefly-infested area

But have a look at this old thread

viewtopic.php?f=9&t=4663&hilit=whitefly+brassica

Thanks to both of you.

Being protected from predators under fleece seems understandable. Sadly I also have quite a lot of un-netted Purple & White sprouting with whitefly on it. So any predators aren't doing much there.

For now I'm living with it.

> i) A lot of wives don't like them

Agreed. Plus my wife is both vegetarian and also very wary of any bugs after having been made to eat garden produce as a child that often contained caterpillars etc.

Hi Colin,
One White Fly is too many for me. At the very early stage of a plants life they can render the plant useless for producing anything meaningful to eat.
Their honeydew does lead to mould and also White Fly carry a host of plant viruses.
White Fly should never be tolerated under any circumstances.
There is no organic treatment for White Fly whatsoever and anybody who will try and convince you otherwise is not telling you the truth!
I use Anti White Fly netting which is a smaller mesh than enviromesh and I get no problems. The problem with this netting is the cost and I suspect that it is not sold off the roll and a roll costs the earth and it is generally only commercial growers who can afford it.
My protection is made up in panels of wooden frames covered with AWF netting which are screwed together and this makes the whole enclosed area impenetrable.
JB.

Johnboy wrote:Hi Colin,
One White Fly is too many for me. At the very early stage of a plants life they can render the plant useless for producing anything meaningful to eat.

Thanks for the info JB.

Interestingly, out of the unprotected plants, our White Sprouting has shown quite prolific leaf but pretty poor flowering sprouts, so that bears out your observation.

Much of the other brassicas under enviromesh have produced a reasonable lot (good heads of Calabrese, with several second crops to follow). This is despite quite a collection of whitefly building up under the netting.

Since we seem to be getting it every year, I wonder if my best recourse is now to buy a pack of Rough Shag (or similar) and brew up some of the nicotine spray. I'm quite happy to use this, though will be following your guidance about choosing bee-free times.

Hi Colin,
The use of Nicotine must be very carefully monitored but if you were to spray with the netting in place very little harm could be done to anything else.
My advice is that when you spray you place a sheet of very light polythene over the area that you are spraying which would mean probably none would get outside the netted area.
The suggested spaying times are 4 days apart. This means usually that the eggs that have been laid will hatch and you then catch the second generation. It is unusual to have to do it a third time.
There has been a lot of adverse publicity towards Nicotine but if used wisely then it really is a superb insecticide and has very little adverse to anything other than the pest you are targeting.
The residue of Nicotine is very short lived by comparison with some of the usual sprays used and it therefore allows you to consume the produce after a few days. ( I expect comment from those who usually do!)
JB.

One tested remedy for whitefly or thrips or for any other small insect pest, I find, is to take a portable vacuum cleaner to them.

Hoovering the garden is very good exercise and ecologically sound. (Provided the vacuum cleaner battery has been recharged from a solar panel, of course. )

John Yeoman wrote:Hoovering the garden is very good exercise and ecologically sound. (Provided the vacuum cleaner battery has been recharged from a solar panel, of course. )

Now there is a comment I don't think Johnboy was expecting

Conjures up a lovely image John Yeoman and reminds me of when I first had new turf laid - I wanted to hoover the garden each day to keep it looking nice!

A pleasing distraction from hoovering the lawn can also be found in spraying the flies in the compost heap with hair lacquer. Quite seriously...

It suppresses them at once and they are transformed into little gems, which can then be hung from a charm bracelet.

Hi Elle,
Regret to say that this has been a part of the Organic arsenal for a great many years. The only snag is that you may collect the flies but you do nothing about the eggs which are left to hatch out and reinfect everywhere again.
Protection against White Fly in the first instance is the way to ward them off your produce.
JB.

You're quite right, Johnboy. There's rarely a single magic bullet against any pest. One tip for burrowing insects like cabbage fly that I've read of, but not tried, is to lay upturned turves cut from one's lawn around the base of the brassica.

Allegedly, the insects will lay their eggs in the turves. One can then take up the turves and burn them.

Hi johnboy. I've just had a look around , and can't seem to find the Anti White Fly netting that you mention. Could you please be more specific, as I use Enviromesh, and my sprouts are covered in whitefly.

Cheers...Freddy.

I think I'm about to be confronted with the whitefly problem myself - but indoors this time. Having successfully over-wintered a couple of chilli plants last year after pruning them back the end of summer, I bought them indoors and did start to find that whitefly could be a problem in keeping them healthy.

I've just brought three pruned back chilli plants indoors for the winter and as they're now regrowing strongly and are bearing a few flowers, any hints for keeping whitefly away would be helpful. (I found last year that the little plastic "smellies" that you can clip onto plants didn't seem to be very effective

freddy wrote:Hi johnboy. I've just had a look around , and can't seem to find the Anti White Fly netting that you mention. Could you please be more specific, as I use Enviromesh, and my sprouts are covered in whitefly.

Cheers...Freddy.

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