Ask Gerry

Purple sprouting brocoli should be ready to eat next April, why is it producing sprouts now?

This year I have grown broccoli, which was gorgeous to eat. Now however, when I cut the little off shoots, they are loaded with caterpillars, and even after steeping broccoli in salted water, there are still caterpillars which are so small they are difficult to see, so they end up getting steamed! The leaves are like lace at this point. I am growing more from seed now (they are only at a very early stage yet in a seed tray), but want to avoid steaming caterpillars! Is there a good organic remedy?

I grew calabrese from plants bought in my local garden centre. Very dissapointed as the heads were very small and very quickly went to seed. I cut the heads off to try to encourage side shoots but little was happening so I have pulled them up. Soil is quite heavy but well manured and plenty of water. What do you think was the problem?

I planted out very mature Sprouting Plants last Saturday and about 25% of them have this on them.I have brought it around to thg local Garden Centres and they have never seen it. Do y0u know what it is and do I need to do anything about it?It is speading very quickly in the infected plants. I am assuming that these JPG files have made it through to you.If not it is a cream coloured blemish on the topside of the leaf but going all the way through.It looks like a number of maps on the leaf.

Every year my brocolli is invaded by caterpillars, I have dealt with this previously by picking them off or using a spray to kill them.However, i would prefer to try to keep them at bay using a net (if possible?), what mesh size would the net need to be in order to be effective?

This might be a silly question but ... my brocolli plants are no longer producing heads, main head and side shoots have being picked, can I pull up the plants and grow something else in its place or is there something else to come!

my broccoli(which were mistakenly sold as cabbage)are growing well but they have yellow flowers like rape seed flowers. they also have very small purplish broccoli-type flowers. is this normal?

I bought calabrese plants and planted them in my polytunnel , about 4 weeks ago. They have grown well but the leaves are loosing colour, becoming spotted and slightly pale or yellowish looking. Is this normal, are they thriving or dying?

Durham early? i bought a nine pack of cabbage in feb and planted them out. they are growing well, i think, but they dont look like cabbage. there doesn't seeem to be any heart forming. to my eye they look more like brocoli. some of them have yellow flowers on them-could they be bolting

I planted seedlings in Dec that were said to be cabbage. The below picture is what i have now. Is this broccoli? Yellow flowers are now coming from it. Has it gone to seed?

Something is munching my Brocolli plants both those bought as plants and those I have grown from seeds. Doesn't seem to be slugs, cant see any tiny eggs or caterpillars although there are small tracks on the reverse of larger leaves? Might it be Vine Weevel although there are lots of big bits from the edges of leaves as well as the middle? The photos below give you a better idea, some of the larger plants have had whole leaves devoured while others have survived attacks, my seedlings are coming on and it looks like they will be victims as well 🙁

Bought some type of brocolli/calabrese plants in a garden centre last June, put them down and didnt really give them any more attention. From about August onwards they started to give lovely crops of these small heads of broccolli, all through the winter until about mid December. Winter came and went and as you can see from the photo they are flowering again. Every time we harvest the heads, about 14 days later we have another great crop. (this photo was taken in mid Feb 2012). So just wondering 1) Should we expect a long season of this great crop? 2) Anything we should be doing to it to keep it going ? 3) Any idea of the variety/name so I will know it when I see it in the shops again?