In article , Tim Challenger
writes

Sparrows, greenfinches and blue tits I've seen picking flowers off plants
(presumably looking for insects).
Field mice? (doubtful) A bit high up for them I'd have thought.

A magpie is possible I suppose, or a blackbird. it's amazing what a
disturbance they can make.

[Sorry - this is a bit long and a bit thread changing...]

I'm pretty sure it was a bunch of blackbirds that took a liking to my
beetroot tops earlier this year. The first time the whole row lost all
its leaves, I blamed the poor innocent snails/slugs. The beet did
recover and produced new leaves - so I put a small scattering of pellets
down - but the tops went again and the plants didn't recover 2nd time
round. There were a few left, so Ipnated more and netted them all - and
now I have lots of healthy beet.

We had lots of young blackbirds in the garden this spring. The tits,
etc seemed to satisfy themselves with the aphids on the fruit trees (but
not enough to stop all that disfiguring leaf curl

[Warning: Thread creep alert]
However, the worst thing has now happened. For the first time, I've
been hit by tomato blight. We had about 20 plants, all doing very well
(all except 2 outside - and half and half in pots and beds.

Two weeks ago we spotted what some disfiguration on a few leaves. Last
week I saw what looked suspiciously like blight "bruises" on several of
the stems. Sprayed everything with Bordeaux. I don't know if this has
slowed things, but in general, it looks as though they are on fast
downward spiral. A few fruit now have blight discolouring - although
most are still a clean green at the moment.

I've removed a few plants that are really badly damaged - and I'm
removing fruit and leaf stalks as I can - carrying out appropriate
cleaning procedures on me and tools.

I guess that its now a race for ripening - and it looks 50/50 at the
moment. However, my shirt is on the blight to win(

Any advice anyone? I know it'll probably be throw them all - but as
everything's already affected, I figure I have nothing to lose by having
a go at keeping and harvesting.

The carrots, golden courgettes, salad leaves/lettuce, cucumber and sweet
corn are helping me not get too despondent. But it is a real blow to
lose so much - when we love toms and even have a nice big chest freezer
this year.

I suspect that the previous owner (we moved in in Dec) had planted spuds
in one area and that these had been infected?. I, unfortunately, did
the same, without knowing there had been spuds there (I can tell because
different spuds then came up between rows).

Is it possible/likely for blight to stick around for a year? If so, any
ideas on what to do next year? Early Bordeaux mixture or no spuds and
toms?

--
regards andyw