Santiago Vignettes

I recently learned that nasturtiums, those of the romantically-beautiful trailing stems and bright orange-red edible flowers, contain similar chemical compounds to plants in the decidedly unromantic cabbage family. This lesson was learned forcibly a few days ago when, on my way out, I realized the exuberant leaves on my nasturtiums were looking a lot less exuberant.  Upon closer inspection, I found the reason why.  Or rather, a few hundred of the reasons why.  Caterpillars.  Thin ones, fat ones. Big ones, little ones. All feasting on my plants, wildly attracted to the same mustard oil compounds found in cabbages.  Have you ever heard of the Cabbage White butterfly and its larvae?  Well, let it be clear why ‘cabbage’ figures prominently in its name. At any rate, as I was investigating my way down the chain of predation, Google suggested I had planted a sacrificial nasturtium patch to protect the (non-existent) cabbage and broccoli in my garden.  No Google, no I did not plant these as a sacrificial offering to the cabbage gods.  I like nasturtiums.  And while I appreciate that I won’t starve for want of a nasturtium bloom in my salad, I’ve little sympathy for the voracious creatures merrily crunching away on them. It’s tedious work plucking caterpillars off plants, but the chickens at the local neighborhood association are gonna love them.