SLUGS-urgh!

kiwiwogger · 21 Mar 2009

Does anyone know how to kill humanely, if at all possible or maybe deter to another garden! I have a mini allotment/herb garden in back garden and a good bird colony, the slugs eat everything, birds can't keep up- tried the beer trap/grapefruit, didn't work. Anyone got any good suggestions?>

EddieM · 21 Mar 2009

Yep, slug pellets, organic ones of course.

kiwiwogger · 21 Mar 2009

thanks i will search for organic, was looking for home remedies-credit crunch and all that, Gordon Brown era- perhaps need home remedy for him or repellent !!!

breezer · 21 Mar 2009

did you know the credit crunch applies to slugs too?.

.

.

.Slugs are really snails with no home

EddieM · 22 Mar 2009

raised beds with a copper strip around, coupled with slug pellets will drastically curtail their behaviour, also put crushed shells around the base of the raised beds.

kiwiwogger · 23 Mar 2009

many thanks, I will have a busy time this coming weekend-slugs beware

JohnD · 23 Mar 2009

slug pellets actually do work, but you have to keep re-applying them around the perimeter of your plot to catch the ones that stroll in from nearby. It takes a while to kill all the resident ones, but keep it up and the population will die down as eventually each of them will walk past a pellet and have a nibble.

if you scatter the pellets out of the rain, and not in piles where birds might eat them, they will eventually work. I prefer the small blue ones.

don't assume that, just because after the first week you still have some slugs, they are not working

you can also get a water-on liquid that you apply to favourite leafy plants. Slugit liquid I think it is called.

kiwiwogger · 24 Mar 2009

I am now fully prepared, patience and determination called for, see how it goes!

JamesA · 25 Mar 2009

Frogs, Toads and Hedgehogs eat slugs as well so its good to be encouraging them in your garden.

I think there is always going to be the need to do some manual slaughter of slugs, snails and general bugs on your veggies.

ColJack · 25 Mar 2009

I hard that slugs don't like porridge oats..
or maybe they do but they swell up when eating them and explode..?

anyway, porridge oats spread round the bast of plants was recomended on at least one telly show..

EddieM · 27 Mar 2009

tiny, mini pill boxes manned by wasps...... No, I've lost it now!

DeadJoe · 27 Mar 2009

Nematodes.

I used them last year, and they were absolutely brilliant. They're little slug parasites that come in a chilled package. You mix them up with water, and water the whole garden, infecting every slug that gets wet. It's good for about 6 weeks, so I deployed it once during the spring when all the plants were small and most at risk of getting scalped. The theory is that once you get past that point, then the plants can outgrow the slugs. A sacrificial crop might be worth considering - plant stuff that the slugs will eat in preference to your best plants. It goes against the grain, but you could always make up for it by going out every evening and searching for the little monsters with a bucket of salty water to drop them in.

Slug pellets are tough on the other wildlife. I'd avoid at all costs.[/b]

EddieM · 28 Mar 2009

Slug pellets are tough on the other wildlife. I'd avoid at all costs.

You can get ones that are safe for birds and other wildlife, but yes I'd avoid those green baby bio ones.

JohnD · 30 Mar 2009

DeadJoe said:
Slug pellets are tough on the other wildlife.

have you got a link to the evidence?

DeadJoe · 30 Mar 2009

Chemical control

When snails are active, slug pellets containing metaldehyde (Scotts Slug Clear Advanced Pellets, Bio Slug and Snail Killer Pellets, Gem Superslug Killer, Westland Slug Buster Pellets, Westland Slug Attack Mini-pellets, Doff Advanced Slug Killer or Doff Slugoids Slug Killer) can be used to protect vulnerable plants, particularly seedlings and newly emerged shoots of herbaceous plants. These pellets can harm other wildlife, pets and young children if eaten in quantity; pellets must always be scattered thinly around the plants.

Slug killers based on aluminium sulphate (such as Doff Slug Attack) are less toxic and can be used as an alternative, particularly in the spring against newly hatched snails.

A relatively new type of pelleted bait, containing ferric phosphate (Growing Success Advanced Slug Killer) is relatively non-toxic to vertebrate animals.

http://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profiles0700/snails.asp

I didn't know about the new ferric phosphate snail killer - I'll give that a go. Most of the cheaper stuff will be the sort that contains Metaldehyde, and that's the one that is worth avoiding. Even if the birds and hedgehogs don't eat the bait, they can still eat poisoned and dying slugs and snails, and come to grief that way...

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SLUGS-urgh!

EddieM

breezer

EddieM

EddieM

EddieM

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