Growing food naturally, that is, without herbicides, pesticides, and fertilizers, poses unique challenges. I would also add that I am a lazy gardener. I do not like to “coddle” plants, nor do I want to worry about plants growing. I like to use what I have at my disposal to make things grow. If something dies due to too much stress, I will use it in my compost. I do not use herbicides, pesticides, or fertilizers, mainly because I do not trust these things on plants I want to consume, but also again because I am lazy. In a previous post, I wrote about the haphazard manner in which I make compost. As stated, this poses some unique challenges.

I want to also add, before talking about the sad death life, I do not like this way of dealing with problems. For the last four years, I have never eradicated any living creatures in my garden. There are one of two reasons, I would argue, why people will kill living creatures, especially in the garden. One, they view them as pests, like slugs. Or two, there is some cultural or historical reason why certain creatures are not loved. (Here is an awesome overview of why the Zulu people might not like chameleons from a Zulu YouTuber.) The problem with both these views is that they promote the reduction of life for your own gain, either to have a pretty garden, or to grow food. And this is where my story enters. Or let us say: Enter the Cabbage White Butterfly (Pieris brassicae) caterpillars.

In this post, I will briefly elaborate on my struggles with this particular pest and my salad rocket and mustard plants. I will also write about a unique problem that I have not come across in posts/articles when I read up on this little innocent-looking butterfly. That is, people often write about alien or non-native insects that attack plants, but they skip over the fact that these plants might also be alien or non-native. I give my two cents about this issue as a gardener who focuses on native and endemic species. I finish up this post with a more holistic approach that we can take to eradicate so-called pests. This is a naïve stance on a problem that is much bigger than we can imagine.

The Cabbage White Butterfly (Pieris brassicae) and Its Caterpillars

With some research, I found that this species of butterfly is not endemic, it is in fact a very big problem in most parts of the world. In various posts/articles, I found that this butterfly was sited probably for the first time in 1994, not so long ago. (Source 1; Source 2; Source 3.) I, unfortunately, do not have a photograph of this little bugger, but it is a white butterfly with black-tipped wings. I sometimes see them fly in the garden, but I mostly see this, their caterpillars.

From the first look, they might be attractive. The dots and colors might remind one of a Jackson Pollock artwork. But their destruction is everything but art, and it fills one with anger. I have ranted about this for so many years now. I leave everything up for nature, if something dies it dies, if something flourishes it flourishes. I interfere minimally. I have some slugs eating my new plants, like basil seedlings and these granadilla seedlings.

(The slugs destroyed this one though.)

(I naively believe that the slugs do not want to kill my plants, so they only eat some parts.)

They also partially eat my Swiss chard. But I plant extra in the sense that I know there will be losses. I plant extra Swiss chard or basil plants because I know that the slugs will eat some. Never have I had the problem that all my plants have been eradicated.

(Again, foolishly or childishly, I believe that some bugs do not go after eradicating crops. I know this belief to be false, but they luckily have not eaten all of my Swiss chard.)

But with the cabbage white butterfly’s caterpillars, I have never had a successful harvest if I do not kill them. As mentioned, I do not like getting rid of what some people call pests. People spray their gardens with chemicals to get rid of the slugs, but the problem is not that big of a deal. Slugs, in my opinion, do not do that much harm and there are safer ways to get rid of them. But these caterpillars will devour up to 100% of all Brassica plants, which includes my salad rocket and mustard greens. It is so bad that they merely leave you the naked stem, eating the juicy green outside layer of the stem as well. If you do not get rid of all of them, by the next morning you might have nothing left. I have lost several crops due to them. And I really do not like them.

As noted, this species of butterflies are non-native and alien in South Africa. There are also very few natural predators of these butterflies, especially their caterpillars. There are two wasps that lay their eggs in the caterpillars, and I have seen in first person the gruesome end that they bring to the poor caterpillar (think Alien the movie). But there are not enough to eradicate them all. And these wasps do not kill them; they carry on with the wasp’s egg inside of the caterpillar. In short, the only method of dealing with these are pesticides or manually picking every caterpillar from the plant. Neither is an option. But now my question is: are the plants from the brassica species even native to Southern Africa?

Non-native Pests Attacking Non-native Species

The species Brassica is not native to Southern Africa. We grow various crops that fall under this species, and the one I grow falls under this species as well. So, we have an interesting problem on our hands: what to do about non-native pests attacking non-native species of plants? If you think about it, this is a fairly large problem. Various crops from this species grow in South Africa but they all are non-native. I am an advocate for growing local indigenous plants and crops, but the viability of this for commercial reasons is shacky. I do not think people have done many studies on them. There are some crops, like pearl millet, that are indigenous. But eradicating all non-native crops for indigenous crops will not happen in the near future, and hence my naïve take on this problem.

A Naïve Solution to a Big Problem

Plant native and indigenous foods. This is a naïve solution to a problem that is way too big to tackle with such naïve solutions. But this solution rings true and is valuable for me. Native plants will most probably attract native pests. Native pests are, in turn, eradicated by local enemies. Local birds might not eat the non-native cabbage white butterfly’s caterpillars, but they might enjoy the local insects and bugs. The non-native plants can also be a problem in the sense that they need more water and care. Native plants have grown natively for centuries. They have adapted to the environment. But now this leaves one in a precarious situation: how do you go about eradicating things like crops in the brassica species (think: broccoli, mustard greens, cabbage, and rocket) in a globalised economy and with a local demand for these products? If I had the answer to this problem, I would have long ago implemented it. For now, I sit in this weird situation in which I love salad rocket, but hate the pests that come with them. And I do not like the situation in which I need to eradicate every caterpillar otherwise I will not have seeds for the next season.

Do you have a similar problem with these pests? Please let me know in the comments! All the photographs are mine, taken with the old but trust Nikon D300. The opinions are also mine, even if they might be wrong! I hope that you do not have a similar problem. This is not a nice one to have.