I've just picked the first few stalks of my Moulin Rouge rhubarb which I've been growing for three years now. The rhubarb is healthy looking and gets fed and watered but despite care I noticed last year and just today that some of the stalks have little holes inside the flesh. Any idea what the cause might be? Last year I threw a whole lot of stalks away because so many were affected. Today I threw away just one but I'd like to fix the problem if I can. Any suggestions as to the cause and a cure would be much appreciated.

I think it just means that the stalks are past their best and should have been picked earlier. I don't think you can prevent it other than to pick more regularly.

Thank you Griz, that could easily be the case because I don't use rhubarb all that much. I think I'll freeze it from now on to have plenty for later

Hello Chris - when I read your post it made me think about the holes that appear in rhubarb leaves which always intrigues me considering the leaf is poisonous (but obviously not to bugs)! I can remember doing a search a few years ago to find out which insect is the culprit, but I could come to no conclusions, perhaps I didn't search hard enough. Today I've found this website
[webcache.googleusercontent.com] I've never come across before which explains the answers to your question re the stems and to my question re the leaves. There's also heaps of recipes which look lovely and appears to be a NZ site (I think). I know I don't use my rhubarb as often as I should - maybe these recipes will spur me on a bit and meanwhile we will rest happy knowing what the possible insect attacks could be and some ideas of what to do about them.
Regards,
Dawn.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 10/28/2015 07:01AM by Dawn.

Thanks, Dawn. I shall explore the site.