12 Cabbage Pests And Storage

Cabbage: Pests And Storage

Cabbage Pests

The best remedy for the cabbage worm is to kill the first brood on the very young plants with Paris green. After the plants begin to head, pyrethrum, kerosene emulsion, or salt water may be used. On a small area, hand-picking may be recommended.

The maggot is the most serious cabbage pest. After studying the seventy odd remedies proposed, Slingerland concludes that six are efficient and practicable: growing the young plants in closely covered frames; tarred paper cards placed snugly about the base of the plants to keep the fly away; rubbing the eggs from the base of the plant; hand-picking of the maggots; treating the plants with emulsion of carbolic acid; treating them with carbon bisulfide. The insecticidal materials are injected or poured into the soil about the base of the plant.

The club-root, which causes the roots to become greatly thickened and distorted, is difficult to manage if cabbages or allied plants are grown continuously on land in which diseased plants have been raised. Changing the location of the cabbage or cauliflower patch is the best procedure. If very different crops, as corn, potatoes, peas, tomatoes, are grown on the land, the disease will be starved out in two or three years.

Cabbage Storage

There are many ways of storing cabbages for winter and spring use, none of which are uniformly successful. On this point T. Greiner writes as follows: "I have heretofore piled a lot of cabbages cut from the stump in a conical heap in the field, and covered them with clusters of the outer leaves cut off with a piece of the stump. The leaves are carefully placed over the heap in shingle fashion, so as to shed water. Cabbages thus piled and covered may be left out until real winter weather sets in. But I find that slugs and earthworms frequently infest the cabbages thus stored, and do a good deal of damage. It might be well to place a solid floor of lime or salt upon the ground, and then pack the cabbages upon this. If to be left out after severe freezing has set in, one should put additional covering, such as straw, corn-stalks or marsh hay, over the whole heap." Mr. Burpee's little book, 'Cabbage and Cauliflower for Profit,' written by J.M. Lupton, a prominent cabbage-grower, suggests the following plan for early winter sales: "Take the cabbages up with the roots on, and store in well-ventilated cellars, where they will keep till mid-winter. Or stack them in some sheltered position about the barn, placing one above the other in tiers, with the roots inside, and covering deeply with seaweed; or if this cannot be obtained, something like cornstalks may be used to keep them from the weather as much as possible. When thus stored, they may be obtained any time during the winter when prices are favorable."