Im­me­di­ate lay­ing a of a net over a nurs­ery bed can pre­vent pest which at­tack seed­lings as the in­tuders search for cell sap, leaves or stems to feed on.

Many a time, seed­lings die fol­low­ing heavy in­fest­a­tion, which also puts them at risk of con­tract­ing dis­eases trans­mit­ted by pests like in­sects.

A new net or re­paired one would keep away grasshop­pers and snails that feed on the leaves of the young plants. Cater­pil­lars at­tack leaves and stems of to­ma­toes, cab­bage, chilly, among oth­ers.

Sim­il­arly, nets would also keep off moths, which lay eggs on the seed­ling at night. The eggs later hatch into lar­vae be­fore cut­ting the stems, or feed on the leaves.

White flies cause massive dam­age on young plants too. They suck the cell sap be­sides trans­mit­ting viral dis­eases. Not­ably, Ac­cess Ag­ri­cul­ture, an ag­ri­cul­tural re­search in­sti­tu­tion, says the flies die after the first ap­plic­a­tion of pesti­cide. By the second and sub­sequent ap­plic­a­tion, the fly could have cre­ated res­ist­ance against the pesti­cide.

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That means the pesti­cide will go to waste be­sides en­dan­ger­ing hu­mans and the en­vir­on­ment be­cause of their chem­ical com­pon­ents.

Lay­ing a shield does not re­quire much ex­pert­ise. With a loc­ally avail­able net a farmer can pin small posts around the nurs­ery bed and lay strong sticks from one end to the other to el­ev­ate the net to about one mitre.

Ap­prox­im­ately one mitre of the ma­ter­ial is covered by soil around the bed to pre­vent entry of pest.

Wa­ter­ing can be done dir­ectly from out­side the shield. It should be re­moved only when the seed­lings are ready to be trans­planted.