A sorry sight ...

I've always had pelargoniums on the balcony. Common as muck they may be, but in full bloom they're glorious. And with a bit of protection they will not only over-winter, and but also sometimes keep on flowering . If you were reading this blog a few years ago, you'll know that I had one container of salmon-pink zonal pelargoniums that went on for two and half years - in all that time, even in January when it was wrapped up in fleece, there wasn't a moment when it wasn't in bloom.

But each year it got progressively more difficult to keep them alive through the summer. And last year I lost the lot.

So this year I replaced them all. Zonals, ivy-leafed, regals .... Here they are in May this year...

And I've lost the lot again.

Why? Again if you've been reading regularly for a few years, you'll guess. It's this ...

Cacyreus Marshalli, or the Geranium Bronze Butterfly. It's always been a problem, but for the last couple of years it's been impossible to keep the plants alive.

A quick recap for those of you who aren't familiar with it. Native to S.Africa (as are pelargoniums), it was introduced to S. Europe about twenty years ago and has been spreading like wildfire ever since. It's been in Italy since 1996, and is now posing a severe threat to commercial pelargonium cultivation - apart from anything else, because people are starting to avoid buying the plants, knowing they won't survive.

Why does it do so much damage? The larvae of the butterfly don't feed on the leaves. They burrow right into the stems and eat the plant from the inside out, killing it. If you can spot the tell-tale holes you can sometimes cut off the affected part - but over the season you frequently end up cutting back the whole plant.

And go away for a few weeks, like I always have to in the summer (...have to? Only a gardener could feel like that about a holiday ) and you come back to this ...

What can be done about them? There don't seem to be many organic options. One of the studies recommends the "natural" insecticide Bacillus thuringiensis Kurstaki - but don't ask me where I'd get hold of it. (Wonder how many times longer than the bacteria the name is?) There is also an insect with the equally wonderful name of Macrolophus caliginosus Wagner, which feeds off the eggs and hatchling larvae - but ditto, and would it stay on the balcony anyway? Another source suggested companion planting. Highly aromatic plants like lavender, mint and thyme are supposed to discourage the butterfly. Well, I can try - but I have my doubts. By pure chance I did have mint growing fairly near the pelargoniums this year. Not close enough maybe ...

Other than that, it seems there are only two choices - swamp the plants with noxious chemicals, or give up on pelargoniums all together. Don't like the first, and don't want to do the second. But it seems the only other option is to invite yet another massacre ...

Useful Links

Lupi and Zucker, The butterfly cacyreus marshalli in Northern Italy and susceptibility of commercial cultivars of pelargonium.

Regione del Veneto, Il licenide dei gerani

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Plants from the Supermarket

Our local supermarket sells plants. As you walk in there are two racks with about eight shelves of annuals, plus a heap of bags of potting compost. Go to the vegetables section and you'll find fresh herbs. Walk on a bit further and you'll find houseplants together with the insecticides and fertilisers. And occasionally, still further in, there'll be a seasonal offer - today it was Bougainvillea, in October it will be Chrysanthemums.

And they all have one thing in common - they're liable to be half dead.

It always amazes me how people will pick up plants in a supermarket which are clearly screaming in agony. They haven't been watered for days, they've been kept in the dark in a storeroom, they've been sitting in the centrally heated atmosphere when they're actually plants which should be outdoors - all of these factors can turn a healthy plant into a dead one in a matter of days. The signs are there - bone dry compost, dead lower leaves, upper leaves or flowers which have just given up and flopped. Just look at it for heaven's sake - you don't have to be a garden expert. And yet they get picked up and shoved into the shopping trolley.

Why? Well, the price of course. When a pelargonium costs €8 at the garden centre and €1.20 at the supermarket, is it surprising that people choose the supermarket? Not to mention the convenience. You have to go to the supermarket anyway, but you'd have to make a special trip to the garden centre. And if you're not a gardener but just want something to pop on the balcony, can you be bothered to do more?



But if you're careful, can you buy decent plants from the supermarket? Well, despite all the above I think you can, and I do - frequently. But it's not like buying a packet of biscuits. They won't all be the same quality and you need to know what you're looking for. Dry soil, brown leaves at the bottom (turn the plant upside down to check) or floppy leaves anywhere are all no-no's. But avoid the clear tell tale signs, dig around at the back of the rack to find the healthiest looking specimens and you can often find bargains. Oh - but avoid the ones in full bloom. They may look great now, but may also be at the end of their flowering period. Go for the ones with the maximum number of buds.



OK, there may still be plants which are stressed but not yet showing it and you may not get super results immediately. Or, even more likely, the plants may be younger than those you'd get at the garden centre, and not quite ready to come into full bloom. Here, at least, the garden centres only stock plants already in flower. It's the buyit - enjoyit - andthrowitaway mentality which I've complained about so often. The idea that you might actually want to watch a plant grow and care for it from one season to the next is still fairly alien to the average plant buyer here. And consequently, in the city at least, the distinction between a garden centre and a nursery doesn't exist. The plants in the photo above are only a third of the size of those in the garden centre. But they're healthy and will grow. Soon they'll be blooming just as well as those in the garden centre are now. And I can wait.

Add to that the fact that the attacks of the geranium bronze butterfly have been increasing in severity so much over the last few years that it's now difficult to keep plants like pelargoniums for longer than one or two years, and you have a good reason for not wanting to invest more than you have to. I lost all mine last year - it was the worst year I've ever had. Replacing them all at garden centre prices would have meant taking out a mortgage - and knowing I'd probably have to do the same next year. Unless of course this year I give in and spray with something more lethal than my usual garlic and cayenne pepper mix. I'm still undecided. Looking back over the blog I noticed that, by chance, two years ago today I was already complaining not only about GBB but also the other bane of my gardening life, red spider mite. This year, probably because it's been fairly cool and wet, there's no sign yet of either. But they're there, I know. Lurking in wait ...

Will she, won't she. Watch this space.

Back to the plot. So, ironically, the supermarket is often the only place you can find plants to have fun with and at a price which makes it worthwhile. If you arrive relatively soon after the plants do, so that they're still looking healthy, then it's worth taking a chance. This is a Campanula which I got eighteen months ago in a 4" pot. One of the disadvantages of supermarket plant shopping is that they're not desperately precise about plant names, but I think it's Campanula Birch Hybrid, a cross between C. portenschlagiana and C. poscharskyana.


But whatever it is, it's thrived. It couldn't care less about heat or cold and has gone from being one of the plants in the container to needing the whole space. The photo was taken several weeks ago, since when it's grown even more. It flowers from April onwards, and has without doubt now established itself as one of my favourites. It's been full of blooms.

All the other plants in the photos originally came from the supermarket too. And I have many more which have grown from cuttings taken from a supermarket plant. If you buy one pelargonium at €1.20 and get six cuttings from it, that's 20 cents a plant. (You see - I've talked before about my mean streak and you didn't believe me, did you?)


My local garden centre won't go out of business - I still spend far more there than I should on out-of-the-ordinary stuff. But if they refuse to give me the smaller, cheaper plants which I want for my staples - well, I shall look elsewhere.

And that means the supermarket. So, next time you're doing your shopping in Milan and you see a lunatic redhead accosting complete strangers and saying - I wouldn't take that one if I were you. This one's much healthier - you know who you're looking at.

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Clean shaven caterpillars?

The boys are back. And I was wondering where they'd got to. Whereas by this time of year the caterpillarium is usually fully inhabited, this year I've not even had to think about it. Until last week that is.

Apart from the dreaded geranium bronze butterfly (cacyreus marshalli) we only really get two types of caterpillar on the balcony, which I suspect are cabbage white larvae. One is the one in the photo above. What is it? The colours are right for the large cabbage white, but it lacks the bristles that all the photos on the net seem to show. We do have a lot of white butterflies around, definitely of the Pieridae family, but the marking isn't quite that of the ones that I've seen illustrated. The other type of caterpillar is green with yellow markings, but doesn't seem to have been around this year at all. Again, it would appear to be very similar to the small Cabbage White, but without the bristles.

Butterflies do, however, exhibit regional variations so I suspect my identifications are correct and its just that Italian caterpillars are clean shaven. Italian men don't go much for beards either, so its obviously a cultural factor.

Anyway, I found the lad in the first photo, plus seven of his brothers and sisters, happily chomping away at an antirrhinum plant. Six are visible in the photo above - can you spot them? In comparison with last year's invasion, when they just about decimated the balcony, this lot are no problem. The plant had finished flowering and I can afford to lose it, so I've left them where they are.

The Geranium Bronze butterfly caterpillar is another matter however. These are definitely not clean shaven but short, squat and bristly. And a sort of odd lozenge shape. But by the time you see them it's too late. The young larva starts life by burrowing into the stems and eating the plant from the inside - see the tell-tale hole?

By the time it emerges as a full grown caterpillar the damage is done. The whole stem has been destroyed.

They're native to South Africa but arrived in Europe twenty years ago and are now widespread over southern Europe, while northern Europe is trying desperately to keep them out. The colder climates in the north may help to stop them spreading, but here they're a plague. I haven't got a plant that's not affected this year. There was an article in the paper the other day saying that geranium sales are down dramatically this year. The article was trying to put it down to the economic recession, but rather contradicted itself by saying that petunias and other annuals are holding their own. I wonder if it isn't just that people are changing away from geraniums because they just get too damaged and tatty. The butterflies are pretty little things, but give me the cabbage whites any day.

Explore some more ...

Cacyreus Marshalli, from the UK Department for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs

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May GBD - Pelargoniums

It's Gardener's Bloom Day again, and the balcony is now looking quite different from last month. The pansies have finished rioting, the summer flowering plants have shot up in height, and the hollyhocks and dahlias are covered in buds but not quite there yet. But the flowers which are dominating this month are my pelargoniums.

I have a love-hate relationship with pelargoniums. They're as common as muck on balconies, and I always feel that perhaps I should be devoting my time and the balcony space to something a bit more original. But if they're common, there's a reason for it - they look so glorious when they're in full flower.


So this year I've succumbed, and the pelargonium collection has grown. I've now got three types - more of the zonal pelargoniums which I've had for years, some new dark pink and white regal pelargoniums, and some ivy-leaved pelargoniums, which I bought last year for the office, transferred here for the winter and never took back.

The ivy leaved pelargoniums were looking pretty tacky at the end of the year, and I had to cut a lot of dead stuff off. But they've sprung back, and now look great from the path outside the house.


I posted about the regal pelargoniums a while back, and Kris of Blithewold left a comment asking if I knew the variety. Annoyingly, I did but have forgotten. I got them at a big flower market which is held here every year, and they were labelled with the variety name. but I didn't write it down and .... I've been hunting on the Internet ever since I got Kris' comment, but can't find anything which is exactly the same.


I've now got zonal pelargoniums in three colours. I took a lot of cuttings from a red variety which I had last year, and those are now thriving. My salmon-pink pelargoniums have been flowering non-stop for years - there hasn't been a week when they've not had at least one bloom - and show no sign of giving up. So I've bought two smaller ones with variegated flowers to keep them company in the container and set them off.


This white pelargonium is another cutting - but I can't for the life of me remember what happened to the mother plant. Anyway, it looks great together with the blue campanula and aubretia in this pot.


Pelargoniums are native of South Africa, and love the hot, sunny conditions we get on the balcony in summer. They don't like the cold, but over-winter well covered with fleece and placed inside the balcony and near the house, where the temperature stays above freezing. They are fairly resistant to pests and diseases, though caterpillars like to munch away at the leaves. The main pest here in southern Europe are the caterpillars of cacyreus marshalli, also a South African native, which was somehow transported to Europe in the late 80s and is now the bane of any pelargonium lover's life. I wrote this post about it last year.

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