An invasion of Slugs

[Izzy]

Yesterday evening I picked up 83 small slugs (each about the size of an AA battery!) off my lawn and surrounding borders.

I don't really want to poor salt or slug pellets on them, but I'd like to get rid of them as they're now making their way through my Hostas and Parsley. Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Izzy

[Jo-grez]

I read somewhere recently that there are something like 100,000 slugs in the average garden so you only got about 99,917 to go

Apparently caffeine does a great job but it needs to be in far greater concentration that you find in a jar of nescafe. Never tried it myself but it might be worth a look.

[fbcpmike]

Well it I had 100,000 in my garden we would be knee deep in the nasty little things.

I have found that a rough base around the plants keeps them at bay as it irritates their undersides.

Eg. Sharp sand especially if it is unwashed as it contains trace amounts of salt so they avoid it, washed is almost as good.

Bark chippings are not bad if small, the coarse sawdust from using a chainsaw is very good, but need replacing each year as it rots. Chippings from an industrial chipper (the sort councils and tree surgeons use) seem to be the best as they are good and rough and the right size.

Also seek out and destroy the damp areas where snails and slugs reside.

Encourage Hedgehogs into your garden, they are quite common even in towns and love slugs, we feed ours (3 of them) the left over cat food to encourage them in and provide "passageways" under the fences so they can get in & out (the food is placed in on of these passages so the cats can't get it). Don't forget to cover drain holes and put a ramp in your pond if you have one, they don't swim very well.

If you have a snail problem and a pond with tadpoles in the spring, chuck the snails in the pond, tadpoles love them.

Some of our hogs www.brickfieldspark.org/data/hedgehog.htm

Mike

[Margaret]

Slugs? love 'em. Well,at least my frogs do.Encourage them and you will never fear another slug again!! The birds get the snails too,so nothing is around for long.Even just a small nature pond is enough to get the amphibians into your garden initially and the interest it brings is just wonderful.

[Sue Wright]

Hi Margaret,

How true it is about the Frogs. Since our population of Frogs has grown we haven't seen half the amount of Slugs. So it is definately true as there have been hundreds all over the lawn and paths before - until the last 3 years!

Sue

[nightshade]

I find that beer traps work well, but begrudge the beer
Frogs are fine as are Hedgehogs but they are difficult to persude to stay
I find that the catapult works well especially with the wind behind you
Try The Grey company`s Trebuchets(Pt.7)
http://members.iinet.net.au/~rmine/G...ebfil.html#son

[StuartDH]

Ha ha ha! I like your style nightshade...load the trebuchet and fling them over to France

Not exactly creature friendly, but it's a lot better than watching them fizzling to death under a shower of salt.

[Boddie]

The french would probably thank you as they would simply eat them. Think about it next time you order l'escargot

[merlinsboy]

It is now September and I am struggling to recall the last sighting of a slug. All summer I have grown Lettuce in a trough and have not had one bite taken from them. Likewise, the Hostas in the ground have escaped all year without damage. Whether my garden is home to a family of Hedgehogs with the most voracious appetites and supreme scavenging skills or the dry(ish) summer has kept them at bay.
Each time I call my father in Pembrokeshire he enters into a long narration of his latest campaign against the demon slugs. Proof again that it always rains in Wales!
The only slimey plant munching fiends I have had to battle with this year are snails, and there were not too many of them either. I'm sure I will pay for this next year!