Plague of Caterpillars

As soon as I saw what the 10 acre crop coming up next to my garden was I decided not to grow cabbages this season. It was a wise move considering what has happened to two self-sown ragged jack kale plants. Their green parts are due more to cabbage white butterfly caterpillars than to actual leaves. There have been hundreds of butterflies fluttering about for the last couple of months.

Today our PM, Jacinda Ardern, announced that from Wednesday the whole country will be in lockdown. Only essential services will be kept going. Everyone else has to stay home for at least four weeks. This is a radical move, but it is necessary to save perhaps thousands of lives. It all sounds unreal to me. What strange times we live in.