Protective Barriers

Last year, we had lost the battle with the insects. Particularly with the caterpillars. We had some great looking crowns if broccoli that we harvested, but when I went to prepare them for cooking they were FILLED with caterpillars and their strings. It was devastating, and we ended up giving the broccoli to the chickens. This was such a traumatic and wasteful experience that we decided to investigate non chemical methods for protecting our crops from infestation. We decided to try the physical barrier method. Row covers have been used by farmers for quite some time and they have the added benefit of frost protection early and late in the growing season. There are many different types of hoops and covers but we went with what we though was the most sturdy and affordable. We landed at the super hoops extended height hoops from gardeners.com as well as a cover that allows 85% light transmission and frost protection down to 26 degrees.

Putting up the hoops was a bit of a learning process, and we discovered that putting them up too early on the mountain resulted in them being blow off (it can get quite windy up here). So around April we put them back up and crossed out fingers. These will not protect the plants from creepy crawlies, but we are hopeful that moths and butterflies that fly by will not want to drip their eggs on our covers or ground.