Never heard that one macky. I think they all prefer pretty fertile soil. I think it's all about a timing thing. I've had differently timed successions of broccoli and cauli in the same plot turn out different sized heads. I can plant them from Aug-Feb, but I notice the closer I get to the winter solstice to planting, the smaller the head. Which makes sense because the amount of sunlight. I also notice that my winter harvests(when planted in late/summer/early fall) are a bit better than my early summer summer harvests. With my Brussels, I get big plants and I get sprouts. They're just always loose leaf sprouts. I read last year that July is supposed to be optimum for them here, so I'll give it one more shot I don't know how that's supposed to work out though -- our summers don't really get going until late july. Kevin

a sharp stream of water will dislodge them and often that's enough if you repeat it every couple days until you stop seeing them. Insecticidal soaps are another option, but it must be sprayed directly on the aphids to kill them. It is non toxic to you or pets, but should not be sprayed on any insect you don't want dead or injured. Neem oil is another option and offers a week or two of residual control. It is non toxic to you or pets and generally won't kill anything that doesn't eat the plant material (but the plant material is safe for anything that isn't an insect).

Naturegirl, my tomatoes are alive, but barely. The rest of them look like they are being eaten by any number of things. I got maybe 5 good ones, the rest of the ones that *would* have been good I think were eaten by the squirrels. The ones that are next to ripen have holes. :( Bummer. I only planted the yellow, low acid ones, and my husband was sort of responsible for the veggie garden this year - and since he doesn't eat tomatoes and doesn't think I should either (he's into the blood type diet and we're "type A" - meaning avoid tomatoes), they were a bit neglected and never properly staked, so a lot ended up drooping to the ground. I was lazy and didn't take care of it myself, I'm not really a true gardener, obviously, but next year I think I will try the little yellow cherry tomatoes, the pear shaped ones. Maybe they will ripen quicker and I can get them before the bugs and squirrels do. I really had no idea the Brussels sprouts were such a late fall crop, so hopefully we'll get something from those. None of the other cruciferous things did particularly well, though we did finally get some decent kale. The plants never got very big, but the bugs didn't bother those. The broccoli on the other hand got huge, but very full of holes and produced such tiny florets. Not worth the amount of space they took up.

These were not just a few aphids! They were covering the plants and down into the leaves of the buds! Yuk! I sprayed before pulling because there were so many and I didn't want to shake them (live) all over the rest of the garden! I think they've already hit my new broccoli. I've never HAD aphids in the 6-7 years I've been vege gardening. What I have now is chard, some snow peas, some late green beans, I'm just pulling up the tomatoes, some broccoli and I have lettuce and beets ready to plant. Do aphids bother any of these, or should I shut down the garden for the winter?