What bit off the leaves of my brassicas!?!

[Becca]

Went to the plot today to find an entire bed of newly planted out broccoli and cauliflower have had their leaves nipped off and left uneaten next to the stalks the plants are surrounded by walls of chicken wire with net over the top (to try and twart the bunnies and the pigeons) and neither defence looks to have been breached.. any ideas what the culprit was? I have had some cabbage whites but I removed as many caterpillars as possible from the survivors from my first planting before planting these and they have only been out a couple of days so it seems very quick for them to have been laid, hatched and munched on such a comprehensively destructive scale..

[Two_Sheds]

..
Snails?

[Demeter]

How big are the plants that have had leaves bitten off?
Sounds like something has eaten the leaf stems but left the rest alone??
Weird!

[Snadger]

Cutworms?

They live in the soil and come out at night and do the damage. If you dig down a few inches under the plant they'll be hiding there. They usually sever the stem though!

[rustylady]

Slugs or snails is my bet. I hate doing it, but I have to use the little blue pellets round newly planted seedlings - PLUS NETTING!!

[Becca]

could be slugs/snails I guess.. haven't really seen many on the plot tho.. my garden at home is overrun with them so that's quite notable.. just seems very odd that the leaves were left.. the plants were about 6inch high, and all I have left is 1-2 inch high stumps + decapitated leaves

[Eyren]

Hi Becca

I've had some success so far (fingers crossed) using fine wood shavings as a slug barrier. I wanted to try bran, as recommended in the recent GYO trial, but couldn't find any in Tesco (apart from some rather expensive stuff in the breakfast cereal aisle), so I bought a pack of Value Small Animal Bedding instead. My newly-planted cavolo nero and PSB appear to be OK so far...

[Becca]

Hiya.. nope, whatever they are they got past that.. have been using my chicken cleaning outs as a mulch and other than the obvious that's mostly woodshavings.. Have come to the conclusion that bed is doomed.. I have a few others planted in my salad bed so hopefully whatever it is won't find them.. on the plus side, I think the woodshaving thing is working for my other veg as I haven't seen any damage on the other beds I've used it on..

[tootles]

I was going to post the same question!!!
Mine were in a seed tray and surrounded by little blue pellets, but were still spoilt.
I almost wouldn't mind quite so much if whoever it was actaully ate the leaves!! (then again I would probably be just as miffed!!!)
There has been no sign of slugs or snails and the compost is new, only the brassicas seem to have this problem. They can be nipped at any size from tiny to a couple of inches.
I would also appreciate any suggestions, so I can stop them!!!!

[Eyren]

Just a thought - do the "nipped" leaf stalk ends match the stumps? That is, have the leaves dropped/broken off by themselves, as it were?

[Becca]

don't think so, will take a closer look tonight, but it has affected about 20 plants in the same bed (and none of the plants from the same batch on the other side of the plot thankfully) so it seems unlikely..