One-minute skills: Making dummy butterflies

[This story first appeared in the Feb-Mar15 issue of Green Ideas magazine.]

Of all the pests in the garden the white cabbage moth is one of our primary nemeses, and funnily enough it is often confused for and admired as a pretty white butterfly roaming the garden. Oh, the irony!It is not the moth itself that is doing the damage but the moth larvae. These camouflaged green caterpillars have huge appetites for your sweet brassica crops and leafy greens.

A happy patch can quickly turn ugly – full of these mini monsters spoiling your hard-earned crops. One avenue is the physical barrier – setting up fine netting over your garden – but another preventative measure, and one that allows you to get your craft on and involve the kids, is making dummy butterflies. Thankfully, while the white cabbage moth larvae are incredibly destructive with huge appetites, the moths are territorial, mostly blind and a little stupid, so bits of plastic dangling on wires can be enough to keep them at bay.

Time to get started:

Step 1 - Our crafting tools: plastic shopping bag, thin wire, thick wire, scissors and tin snips.

Step 2 - Cut strips off the plastic bag to make the butterflies. You want 10–15cm lengths that are about 3cm in width.

Step 3 - Create the butterfly body by pinching the middle of the plastic and securing with the thin wire. Can’t believe how lifelike they’re already looking!

Step 4 - Trim the wings to make them round.

Step 5 - Cut some 40–50cm lengths of the thicker wire – probably best not to let the kids play with the tin snips – and attach butterflies to them.

Step 6 - Get the kids to help you place them around the patch where the larvae have been causing trouble. There is safety in numbers, so put a good few in and set the vibe.

Step 7 - Hmm, don’t think it’s worked. Still white cabbage moths everywhere. Or are there?