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I have planted around a month ago several small plants of cabbage, broccoli, kales, and arranged also a raised beds for herbs.

1: Pests. Lately, I noticed that most of the plants had been bitten, some of them almost destroyed. I took some measures to keep slugs away, having caught at night many slugs hanging around. Now, it seems that slugs are not as numerous as before, but little holes still appear on the leaves. I uploaded some photos.

How to figure out what is attacking the plants? What should I try in order to get rid of it?

The big damages you see in the photo has been produced before the slugs were kept away, the little holes came up later.

2: Fungi. Another strange issue is that this morning some clusters of fungi appeared on top of the compost in my raised beds. Is that any good? Should I get rid of them? How? It can be of help knowing that my beds are filled with cardboards at the bottom, a layer of prunings (mainly small tree branches) and hay, also there is some nettle and on the top some coffee-grounds have been crumbled now and then.

Basil leaves Broccoli Cabbage

Fungi Fungi2

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  • The plants are a good bit bigger than when you asked your last question. The fungi are merely digesting the undecomposed plant material so that the plants can access the nutrients held in it.
    – J. Musser
    Jul 28, 2014 at 5:51

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Fungus is just part of a healthy ecosystem. I think it should be fine, but you can pull them if you choose. They live on decaying material in the soil.

The bugs can be anything. I would think slugs still, but it could be grasshoppers. You didn't mention where you were located or the climate right now.

I had the same problem with cabbage a few years ago, and it was the grasshoppers that were destroying them. It was a very hot, dry summer. Conditions that they love.

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  • I agree it looks like either slugs or earwigs.
    – J. Musser
    Jul 25, 2014 at 22:13
  • It could be earwigs, actually. I have seen some around too. But if I put a trap with oil in a bottle bottom, I don't really catch any. Other ideas? Are wool pellets in your opinion a good control against slugs?
    – usumdelphini
    Jul 27, 2014 at 5:47
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    @usumdelphini I used to trap earwigs by placing rolled up newspapers through the garden overnight, and the earwigs will shelter in them. During the day, I'd walk through opening them over a bucket with kerosene at the bottom. I caught quite a few that way. On slugs, I put a copper ring around the base of each plant. Slugs hate crawling over copper. This only works if you keep the leaves out of reach of the ground.
    – J. Musser
    Jul 28, 2014 at 5:47
  • As far as I know, earwigs will not damage your plants. I could be slugs or cabbage worms. I lean towards the latter based on the kale pictures in your question.
    – JStorage
    Jun 15, 2017 at 21:42
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I encountered a very similar issue with my Kale plants. Look under the leaves (sometimes on the front side as well) to look for green worms. Cabbage worms are attracted to brassicas and from the damage to the kale, it looks like cabbage worms. I hand picked them out of the kale while they were young to limit the damage. If you see any eggs as well, you can squash them so they don't develop into worms. Finally for future reference, you can use row covers to cover up the brassicas around this time of the year to prevent recurrence.

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