If you want to go ORGANIC, try compost tea and/or worm tea. I have repeatedly read how effective this is even when chemicals couldn't get rid of some disease, feeding compost tea took care of it.

Give it a shot.

Hi trivedi south...how would i go about making compost tea/worm tea? I am a total newbie to this. Other than growing the cabbage last year (and having the whole thing eaten pretty much), I am new to this.

Thank you for your help!!!

Bt ( brand names Dipel or Thuricide) will take out cabbage worms and loopers which are are the worst pests of the brassica group. Slugs can also be a problem but that requires a different solution.

I too got involved in setting up my daughter's science class with cabbages from bonnie plants. What a great program! the variety is O.H. Cross which gets huge. I would say 15-20 pounds but doubt 50 pounds unless you live in alaska (cool and 20 hours of sun in summer?).

The cabbage issue is cabbage looper and cabbage worm. We sprayed ours once a week with BT. Also called Dipel under
one manufacturer's trademark. It is a dead bacteria in suspension. Totally safe and organic. It acts as a gut poison on caterpillers only (lepidopterus larvae). I just
mix it in a quart mister bottle and mist once a week on the
foliage.

My daughter had the second biggest cabbage in her class. The winner was bigger but looked like swiss cheese with all
the holes in it. At least we could eat ours.

Hooray to Bonnie Plants as a fantastic program on their part.

Well, there are really two things you can do.

1: Plant something as a ground cover that the cabbage moths don't like/confuses them. corsican mint and wild thyme spring to mind, but any old herbs will probably do well enough. The more aromatic, the better. Certain flowers like marigolds and yarrow also work.

2: Plant things away from your cabbages that the moths like better. Something like wild mustard would be ideal.

You can also put mesh or floating row cover over the plants so the moths can't get inside to lay their eggs on the plant, which is where the worms come from in the first place.

Use Safari at one tsp/gal for foliage pest and diazinon for root maggots.You shouldn't eat it though. BT works for caterpillars too.