With the amount of destruction the caterpillars caused during the summer, I was doubtful these Kale plants would grow back. But once the cooler weather came around the insects mostly have stopped feeding on them and now I see lots of growth. Kale plants are biennial's meaning they will only live for two years. I did not grow these from seed so I am not sure how old they are, but since they are coming back I think they are only a year old. So maybe I will get a whole other year out of them before they die back.
Even if they do die back, I have collected hundreds of seeds from these plants. And some have dropped around the Kale plant starting new sproutings around the adult plants. I wonder if the seeds are hybrid Kale plants as I had quite a few different kinds when they all flowered.
Pretty amazing the Kale around the Lemon Balm is still mostly unaffected by the insects. I planted some Mexican Tarragon around Kale as I hear it can help with caterpillars too. It would seem the rosemary did not help, but was worth a try planting that near the Kale plants.
These leaves are getting big enough to harvest and make some kind of sautéed plate using these greens.
I have never grown Kale before, so curious how it will fair in the cold. It is a suited down to zone 7, so I expect it to do fine here.
The other Kale plants that got eaten up during the summer are mostly coming back. A couple of them died, maybe due shock or maybe it was their second year already. The purple one and the plant with those crumply leaves did not come back after getting all eaten up.
But enough has survived to give me lots of greens and maybe next year I will just try to grow these in the fall so those caterpillars do not eat them all up.
