Our cabbage plants are the prettiest ones we’ve ever started. They were getting awful big and we finally got them planted yesterday.
Pap always grew cabbage in his garden and he always fought the pestilence that attacked them. We did too until Ed Ammons told us about covering the plants with netting to keep worms and bugs at bay.
We’ve been growing our cabbage under netting for several years now. There’s a little extra work to the set up, but not having to worry about the pestilence makes it well worth it.
The cover we use can be found at most gardening stores and online. It allows for sunshine and rain to go through easily, but keeps the pests off the cabbage plants as they grow. A lot of folks have told me they use tulle fabric as row cover.
For the last couple of years we’ve put a weed barrier under the cabbage.
One year we planted the cabbage close to one of my flower beds. Oh my the weeds and flowers filled the fabric tunnel till you couldn’t even see the cabbage! So if you’re planting in an area that is prone to big weeds or flowers a weed barrier is a must.
Cabbage is one of my favorite vegetables to eat. I like it anyway you can cook or can it. I also like it raw in coleslaw. Sometimes I eat a big hunk of cabbage with a sprinkle of salt for a snack.
Last night’s video: Dirt Floor Basements & Thankful for the Tractor.
Tipper
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Your cabbage garden look so pretty. Makes my mouth water just thinking about eating that delicious vegetable anyway you fix it. You and Matt did a great job laying it out, the planting of it. Hope the yield is high and your bounty is coming soon.
My mama liked to eat the cabbage core while making coleslaw or whatever. I like it too, with it’s spicy bite like radish.
Catching up on some of your blog posts—it looks like more canned coleslaw awaits you this year if you do it again!
I love cabbage too! Yum.
Pretty plants for sure! Agree cabbage is a favorite vegetable of mine too. So delicious any way you fix it.
Yay, the cabbage is in the ground!! They looked great in the greenhouse but even better outside. Like Pap, Daddy fought off the worms and bugs. I don’t recall anyone using netting back then, but I think it’s a wonderful idea and I pray you have a bountiful crop of cabbage and everything else that you will grow!
Loved your video yesterday as always . I need Matts tractor lol it would make life much easier. theres a 52 ford 8n in the tractor shed but its not running. my husband was very good with engines but that suborn thing just wouldnt crank. I dont know what happen to it. he showed it every year and won 11 trophy’s out 12 years . one year he wanted to show but wasn’t able to clean it all up. so I cleaned the tractor ,truck and trailer up so he could go. then his heart got so bad he wasn’t able to show it or work on it.
I’m hoping to get some green peas planted today . so much to do around here hopefully I can get it done.
hope yall have a great day.
susie
Morning everyone. I use the netting on zucchini and squashes. It does help for a while but the squash bugs always get in somehow. I didn’t grow zucchini last year. No bugs. It’s just me and one son, so 1 plant would be enough. Maybe I’ll grow some this year. Anna from Arkansas.
I too love cabbage in whatever form I can get it. My favorite way to cook it is to fry out some bacon and sautee sliced onions, bell peppers and mushrooms in the grease. Add shredded cabbage, turn the heat to low and let it steam over the vegetables. You would want to catch it while the cabbage still has some crunch to it. Crumble the bacon back over the cabbage. That and some cornbread is all you need.
That sounds delicious! I have never added mushrooms or bacon. I will have to try it.
Good morning Tipper and acorns! We don’t plant our gardens until May long weekend, so there’s still two months to go. I’ll start my seeds at the end of this month and I really look forward to that. I used a row cover last year for my cabbages and broccoli and it sure worked well. Kept all the dreaded cabbage moths away. A dear friend made me a large frame covered in netting that I grew collard greens (which are hard to find in Alberta) and turnips, that worked well to keep all the pests away. I love gardening and have a fairly large one so I can share with friends that, due to health, are unable to garden and my daughter and her family. Over the years I have learned so much from watching Celebrating Appalachia and BP&A, I thank you Tipper, because you can teach old dogs new tricks! Have a wonderful day!
Tipper – do you ever make ‘lazy cabbage rolls ‘ where instead of rolling the filling in the cabbage leaves, one just layers the sliced cabbage and filling almost like making lasagna, then pour over the tomato soup, juice or sauce. Less hassle and time doing it this way, and I think it has more flavor doing it in layers. I also like to add some grated parmesan or mozzarella cheese on top. I enjoyed last night’s video of plowing and mulching the ‘big’ garden areas. Things are looking good in Wilson Holler! 🙂
I’ve never tried that but it sounds good 🙂
A man & his tractor!
I always used to beg Mom for the cabbage heart when she was cutting up a head of it; love to snack on that!
Cabbage is so good and good for you, too. Mom raised a ton of cabbage every year and used most of it to make kraut. She would also wedge it, roll it in cornmeal, and fry it good and brown in bacon grease. That’s my favorite way to eat it. I’m glad you got the plants out of the greenhouse and into the ground so you can watch them grow when the warm sunshine hits them in a few days.
Your cabbages are lovely and my “stems”cannot compare. Cabbage is a great vegetable and the nutrition benefits are out of this world! It gives off a gas (as it lays fermenting in the gut) that really does great things for the gut. It’s almost as if that gas is exactly perfect for gut bacteria and happiness. It also helps with easier stools. My cabbage thus far is nothing I care to discuss. I’ve managed to eat a few of mine in the past, but they were “awful puny.” I mean a dad burn cabbage ain’t easy to grow! It’s devotion and TLC. It’s good to see the bright side when a marriage goes “south” a woman can wrestle the “tulle” off her old wedding gown and grow some cabbages! She can say at least some good and growth came of that bad decision…lol. She can take the rest of the old ball and chain uniform and fashion a most frightening, yet dandy scarecrow!!!! It’s a win/ win, Tipper!!! Lol and yall laugh cause Jerry Clower would want us to…
I love cabbage too. I make fried cabbage, cooked cabbage with potatoes, cole slaw and cabbage rolls. I made a new cabbage recipe the other day. It was fried with onions, peppers, soy sauce and a few other seasonings. It was yummy. When my son was little, he didn’t like cabbage made into anything, but he would eat it plain. When I would make it, I would save him a wedge and he would eat that with his dinner. Getting children to eat their veggies makes a mommy happy!
Your cabbage row is so neat. I have never used row covers but know I should. I don’t try any more to grow cool season things like cabbage, broccoli or brussel.sprouts in the spring. It gets too hot before they can make. If I have them in the fall garden by September the cabbage butterflies lay eggs all over them and/or the fuzzy sucking aphids get all over them. I probably just get too discouraged to even try to have a garden. Seems challenges just keep building up through each season and also year-to-year. Glad you have a preventive. Next trip to the feed & seed I’ll have to look for row covers. I could be tempted once I got started to try covering summer squash – but then how would they get polinated? I have had no luck with them for several years now. Squash bugs and squash borers kill them before they can do much at all. Wish I could cover tomato plants from the leaf-footed beetles but then how could they get pollinated? I do have fruit bags but have not used them yet. Ah well, it is the gardening life.
That mulch looks beautiful next to the cabbage, Tipper! What a great accomplishment and good feeling to have it in the ground. I also love cabbage and would consider it one of my favorite vegetables. This is one of my very favorite ways to make it. It’s SO good! https://smittenkitchen.com/2025/04/charred-salt-and-vinegar-cabbage/
beautiful cabbage plants, praise God, God bless you all and have a great day, thank you for praying for my brother please continue to do so
Have you ever made bierocks?
I never have but I make sweet hand pies 🙂
I love cabbage but I only eat it raw in coleslaw. My husband doesn’t like the cabbage smell while cooking. Cabbage has a cabbage smell!
Mmmm, mmmm, cabbage is probably my favorite vegetable! My favorite way to make it is on the grill. Butter, salt and pepper wedges, wrap in foil, and grill. A lot like fried, only better!
My sister likes to put some bacon in too.
So nice to see another job behind you!
Only way I like it is coleslaw and fried with bacon. Don’t care for boiled cabbage
Good morning Tipper and Acorns. I really enjoyed last evenings video. I’ll watch it again today. I’m glad y’all got the cabbage in the ground. I’m watching your Kraut video from 2021 right now. I’m watching My Life In Appalachia 17 and the video links in that post. Almost all of the snow and ice melted yesterday afternoon. There is still plenty along the creek in the back yard. It should melt some today. TY all for your prayers, Ed has felt some better and been able to eat a little bit more. Pray without ceasing. Praise GOD in everything. Remain humble. Please keep us in your prayers. GOD’s Will be done in all things. TY. I keep everyone here and up Wilson Hollow in my prayers. I love Y’all.
Several things this morning. I also love eating cabbage although I just buy them and no longer plant them. I don’t know how I got along for so many years without a tractor with a front end loader or bucket, they are so useful. I didn’t realize how much the boys have grown, seeing him brought back many happy memories of my children and grandchildren. Now for the one that really hurts, I remember when I could walk and do anything I wanted too, use to work with my wife and do things together, but that was yesterday and yesterday is gone. After tying to work and do some things last Saturday, I went to be bed Saturday night feeling like I might “throw up” because of the pain and hurting so bad from arthritis.
I have planted cabbages for a couple of years now. I will have to remember about the netting in 2 months when I will be planting my garden. Tipper at what stage in the cabbage growing do you add the netting?
As soon as you can 🙂 We try to cover it the day we plant it.
One year I used a netting that was a lot like chicken wire but green plastic and in a roll. Very soft. I had one of my favorite birds get caught in it, a Carolina wren. It broke my heart. It killed it. Do you ever have problems with birds getting stuck in this netting? I would love to find something that keeps the cabbage moths off of my cabbage and greens. And you talked to me into it, this year I’m going to try weed block.
We’ve never had that happen here. What we use has a pretty tight weave so I don’t think a bird could get caught in it. I hope you have a great garden!
Thank you, Tipper!