Slugs/Snails

To those of you who "have tried everything" - what worked best for you? Just curious. Many thanks :)

I've used the slug bait, which helped a lot. The beer didn't work. I guess slugs in my area are teetotalers! Salt only works on the ones you find. Doesn't appear to be much of a deterrent.

My best defense the last few years has been the tried and true "stomp" method. I'd rather "stomp" them (instant death) rather than using salt (looks rather agonizing, and takes a while).

Anyway. I've given up trying to plant things that really attract them, like marigolds (gone overnight). Hostas too, although I would love to grow them, and they do well here. The deer beat the slugs/snails to them. Eat them right to the ground! I've lost about a dozen hostas, and decided that it wasn't worth it!

There are numerous plants that grow in our area that are less attractive to slugs/snails/deer, etc, so I guess I'm too lazy (I prefer to call it efficient) to fight a losing battle just to grow certain plants, even if I love them. We've gone pretty much native, but still have some hardy cultivars.

I suppose it has to do with attitude and flexibility. I can understand wanting to grow plants that you really love, and have certainly tried in the past. But I've found so many others that thrive here, that don't require so much effort, and still provide a lot of pleasure. I guess I'm too old and decrepit to fight Mother Nature anymore! :)

Judith

Depends if you are into organic or not. Beer traps, corn meal, hunt and pick, spray the fences with saltwater. If all else fails, use Deadline.

What's Deadline?

Judith

It is a liquid. Deadline is the brand name. You put it around the plants and the snails and slugs are attracted to it and go no further. You end up with a "line" of dead snails. Best stuff I have ever used but I have no animals or very small children to worry about. I only use it when organic means fail every now and again. I live near a creek and every now and again we get a bad snail year.

Thanks! Haven't heard of it before.

I'll give it a try. Won't help the hostas (deer food), but maybe I can try marigolds again!

Judith

Good luck! I have decided that they are not worth the effort. I have friends that grow them with no problem but mine seem to attract snails too.

There are some newer slug baits on the market that use Iron Phosphate rather than the old metaldehide that was so poisonous to animals. One of them is called Sluggo, and seems to work OK in my garden, and Missy doesn't appear to be attracted to it. Also remembered that a spray bottle with a dilute ammonia solution works well with the little slugs.

This message was edited Mar 21, 2004 9:36 AM

Bran meal and milk, they can't digest it easily but they'll eat it and be unable to eat your plants (they do die too). I find it's not the big slugs that are the problem but the tiny slugs that hide under the soil

I tried about all of the above and the best so far is a large hand held spot light a ziplock baggie and hand picking. I get home from work about 10:30 pm and head straight out with my light. Bag em up and toss into trash.

After a few days of that it gets noticably harder to spot them and they are generally smaller. But I refuse to surrender and perserverance usually pays off.

Oh, and potting up my Hosta and putting them in the shade near my favorite seating spot makes it simple to keep a closer eye on them. Of course this is only working for me because the garden is so small and easy to patrol nightly. When we had a larger area I let the ducks and the neighbors hens take care of it.

I used sluggo this year during our rainy season (January-February), and it seems to have put a pretty good dent in the slug population. It is not poisonous and breaks down into Iron Phosphate I believe. The only problem I've had with it is it tends to mold once the temperatures start getting warm.

I use Sluggo combined with handpicking. I go out with a flashlight, large cup of hot salt water and a pair of tongs. I use the tongs to pick them up and put them in the salt water.

While Sluggo helps a lot, I find myself compelled to hand pick when I start seeing slugs on my back porch.

The beer traps also work - but I hate the clean up.

I used all of the above until I find out coffee. When you brew coffee do not dicard the coffee ground left in your coffe maker.

Slug do not get near the plant or where you have sprinkled the coffee ground!

Guess I'm onna have to switch from tea to coffee! They slime right across tea leaves :~(

To protect birds, hedgehogs etc., from slug pellets, put the pellets under an old broken tile or large stone (upside down flower pots work too) close to the plants they attack - that is exactly where slugs like to hide during the daytime. Then when the wake up feeling peckish... suicide pills... :o)

I usually don't have much of a problem with slugs, but
spraying them with a mixture of vinegar and water (1 cup water 1/2 cup vinegar) works wonders. The slugs literally melt before your eyes.
By leaving them where they lay, it also discourages other slugs. The acidity of the mix shouldn't harm any of the plantings. In fact, many of the acid loving plants usually do better

CoCo: I have tried your cocktail and, you are right, they don't like vinegar at all. How experienced are you with that method?

My situation: I have no more large slugs; learned to pick and destroy. Now I am losing petunias, for example, as fast as I can buy them, due to the tiny slugs that live under the dirt, rather than under rocks, etc. The few slugs that came above ground and tried to hide in the leaves, I collected and gave a vinegar shower.

My question: how do the plants (petunias) like a vinegar drink? Can I just soak the soil around their roots with this mixture? Please answer quickly. Most of the petunias have already wilted and shriveled away form the slug damage.

I use straight household ammonia in a spray bottle. They die instantly. So far I haven't seen any damage on the plant from the spray. And ammonia is used by plants as nitrogen.

How about using windex? Seems the vinegar may be just the thing, and everyone has windex handy at home. I wonder if any plants would disagree with the windex though. I've been getting tons of tiny snails this last week, and am trying the beer trap right now. They killed a pentas only thus far...but i see them on everything! Argh!

what exactly do these slugs look like?....I was just out there this afternoon, and put in a few furns by my poor eatin hostas, and while digging I dug up a few white ugly bugs?....could these be the infamous slugs?
Nicerfarm

If they were soft and squshy, sometimes short and fat, sometimes long and thin with no real head or tail you may have seen slugs. They have a sticky substance on them that helps them to stick to everything. They leave silvery shiny trails where ever they go. Ammonia will melt them instantly and is converted to nitrogen by the plants and the soil it is poured onto.

Last year the slugs destroyed my marigolds, some of my hostas and had a few snacks at my tomato plants. This year I put down the slug bait a couple weeks before preparing my beds. I put down a new application after planting, so far no sight of slugs. I will probably put down more applications through the season. Most of my beds are protected from wandering animals, so hopefully the slug bait will only be lethal to them.

Hermitess - The best defense may be cleaning up - weeds, dead leaves/plants, rocks, sticks - anything that keeps the ground moist. I'm struggling myself - fifth year here with too much shade, low, wet lot, - these slugs are a stinker! It'll probably be a combination of things that eventually works/helps.

Nicerfarm - Those white wormy things may be grubs (Did they have legs and were kinda curled up?). The grubs can damage plants as well - starting from the roots as opposed to the slugs which start usually from the soil line up. You really can't mistake the slugs. They're just like a snail without a shell. Not white though. They're more greyish - they look like slime but they move when disturbed. You'll find the white grubs UNDER the soil but the slugs will be - well - just lift up any rock or plant or anything lying on the ground in a damp spot. And take the salt shaker!

Everyone else - thanks for the additional helpers. I'm going to try them all!

I've also used rings of coarse sand paper around the bottoms of plants to deter the slugs. It will tear up their undersides to crawl across it. Copper wire is suppose to stop them too.

Well, I doused an entire area with coffee grinds straight from the can (as we arent coffee drinkers, I dont have left over grinds)....and absolutely no sign of snails the next day or thereafter. Woohooo!