Pests: Calling all slug experts! (Not for the faint of heart)

My buffo toads are really good at controling this problem, although they are a kind of danger to the(small) dogs, and the kids who love to go "toad licking" to get high! (The poison they excrete when feeling threatened is akin to digitalis, slowing the heart rate; haven't tried it myself.)
That and the "snail bait" is keeping these rotten critters at bay in my garden anyway...otherwise, the tip about beer in bowls hidden under low boxes, or upside down pots placed in the garden is a real winner.
They hide there at night and while its yucckie to clean it all out, your plants will prosper!
But- still~ ULGH and Oooooo-the eight inch blighters would be too much for me- blgh, shudder...
Courage!
:)

Laughing is good, even if your sides give out. I don't know that poison toads are what I'm going to introduce into my yard tomorrow though. (LOL) Snails are actually very good. But it's the garlic butter that is really really good, and you can eat that on a lot of other things that aren't quite so - well you know. Not too many French restaurants even serve them anymore. Probably your Buffalo Toads would get too cold here anyway (sigh).

I know that I've mentioned our foot long banana slugs (bright yellow) before here. However, your kids may lick the frogs, but the banana slugs are protected here and it's illegal to lick them. Not so good for the slugs. Now there is an answer to the problem. Get your kids to lick the slugs. Think you can convince them it's as good as toad? You are already half on your way!

These toads are protected too (?????)Go figure! They came from australia, and nobody knows what to do with them...
They can get as big as kittens, are dry but kinda loose and gushie feeling,
Woah! MY kids dont go toad lickin' ( I live in Miami for goodness sakes, home of the drug culture extrodinare! No one goes toad lickin when there is pharmecuical grade cocaine right down at the port!) Raising drug aware kids is totaly hard here. Mine dont do drugs, at least not yet, anyway, and my eye is so alway peeled...picture it!
Thank God!!!! (Really....I thank Him every day.)
Still, I have not heard of a slug that hated beer and a dark place. The original lounge lizard.
Maybe if you play a little blues and black light to back light, too? Get them little chairs...and save your mai tai drink umbrellas!!!!!!!! But still I shudder at the mere thought of 8 inch slugs, at least the toads go run and hide when its light out...
LOLOLOL!!!!!
:)

A sluggy blues joint! I love it! Maybe we should start painting the inside of our slug hotels and adding those little battery type music things you can get in greeting cards!

At the silly juice again huh? Sure you folks haven't been imbibing under old pieces of board with the slugs?

And why aren't those toads out working at night eating slugs? Do they belong to some union that doesn't allow night shifts. If you're going to have toads croaking the least they could do is earn their keep.

It seems to me that just about anything that eats slugs also likes the plants in the garden. Chickens pop them like Ju Ju Bees, but they also scratch around the plants and peck away at things. If I could convince folks that slugs are tasty, maybe they'd eat them out of existance.

OK, here's my extermination method: Put about a 1/2 cup of seasoned flour into the bottom of a paper lunch sack. Go out into the garden and each time you find a slug, drop it into the bag. When you have enough... about a half cup per person, heat some butter in a saucepan, shake the bag, and dump the little fellows in. If we all ate a cup of slugs a week, eventually they'd be an endangered species.

Don't forget the garlic. :-)

OK, doss, s bit of garlic, no need to add thyme... they've been munching on that, so they are seasoned internally.

Could my dogs eat them for me? Or maybe my imaginary friend. I'm getting cold feet here and I don't even live in Alaska. YUCHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

Give it a try, Doss. The big yellow ones taste like bananas.

Weezingreens, You've forgotten, banana slugs are protected here in California. There is another key to cooking snails. You put them in cornmeal for a few days before you cook them to "clean them out' so to speak. You should try it with your slugs.

I don't 'clean them out' because they are already stuffed with fresh garden veggies and herbs. Come on, Doss, don't you 'poach' those banana slugs... I mean that in both the legal and culinary sense.

Now that's really funny! (LOLOLOLOLOL)

;)

I have tried traps, bait....they work to some extent, but, I had to add additional procedures. I take the undrunk coffee from the day, and hook it up to my garden sprayer, and spray the bed. There was research done in Hawaii, seemed they had an overpopulation of a certain frog....well, to make a long story short, they sprayed the experimental gardens with coffee, it didn't kill the frogs, but they found hundreds of dead slugs. So, I use that method, and it works. I also use an ammonia and water mixture, in a garden spray bottle, add 1oz of non-sudsy ammonia, and fill the bottle with water...the only downfall with this is you have to spray the slug directly...I go slug huntin' every night in the summer. My DH calles me "the great white slug hunter"....lol...I still use the traps, and I still use the bait, oh, heck, I'll try anything. Thanks for the additional ideas!

Maxxy

If anyone gets "The Hosta Journal", there is a book, published in the UK called "The Little Book of Slugs"...it is a compilation of tips from 300 UK gardeners. They seek to offer alternatives to the use of chemical poisons in the garden. Some of the methods have not been tested by the editors, and not all of the techniques have been found to be practical or substantial for any long term effectivness.
I am going to look for it, and see what's inside!

Maxxy

I have a method of stopping slugs......... Several years ago when I lived in California, where they seem to grow right out of the air.......... I almost lost a pet to slug poison., So I started to experiment. Guess what stopped them!!! Plain old Comet Cleanser, I sprinkles it anound the edges of the flower bed and waited. The comet cut thru the mucus layer and killed them. Pets left it alone because of the smell. And I replaced after each watering. Didn't hurt the plants either. Living in Michigan now it still works here

Hello from just South of you (Seattle/Tacoma)! One thing that I always remembered from my integrated pest management class was about the "breathing hole" on the slug. So, how I help reduce the slug population around our place...

I have a spray bottle filled with ammonia (yes, straight ammonia!). I take this out in the evenings at dusk and spray the little sluggies right in the hole. They curl up and die, then shrivel up and dry. It's a pretty clean method; just requires time and persistance.

I'll have to look for that breathing hole!

Ok folks . . . I've spent hours reading and researching how to get rid of the little buggers:

Here are the several methods I've tried and have worked successfully -- and no chemicals to harm pets:

Take a styrofoam plate and pour beer on the plate -- put the plates on the outside of the garden so the slugs get to the plate before they get to the plants. I've seen them head right for the plate even when they were originally headed for the plants. They drink and either drown or get alcohol poisoning.

Another method is to sprinkle salt on them -- oooooeeeee -- yucko, but they disintigrate. DO NOT SPRINKLE SALT ANYWHERE NEAR PLANTS -- it will kill the plants (and grass and anything else).

Another method is to put a copper strip (at least 2" tall/wide) around the garden. The chemical makeup does something nasty to them and they won't cross the threshold.

Another method is the spritzer of ammonia.

Another method is to surround your garden with something coarse -- like cornmeal -- HOWEVER, and this is a big however -- I have tried putting gravel, sand, coarse mulch and a variety of other items around the bases of their favorite plants and none of that has worked. If they are hungry enough, they'll travel across even white sand to get to their food supply.

Their homes: I've found them laying eggs under logs, under terracotta planters and all other variety of things in my yard. About once a week, I lift up whatever they could be under and sprinkle them with salt -- but be careful -- salt will kill your plants and grass and whatever else it comes into contact with.

The only other non-chemical method I've found is to smash them -- and I have an old 2x2 piece of wood that I carry around in the evening for just that purpose.

Remember that after a rain the slugs harvest (and they come out most after the dew sets because it is easier on their bodies to travel when its wet). I am on the prowl after a rain to kill the buggers.

Good luck!

I usally use slug bait to kill when I notice holes in leaves early in the season. The funny thing I noticed this january a mostly empty beer can
in boxwood shrubery. As I was just about to clean and empty out the can discovered several snails inside the can. I thought what a great idea. In the future I think I'll do as the neighbors>drink up most of the beer in the can , then throw the can in the bushes to capture the slug pest. I'll probably have to place the can in an inconspicuous place so no one picks up the can !

Your theory may be true but maybe not. Who really got the beer?

Your theory may be true or maybe not.

You guys are all a kick. Here is a slug story I like to tell. One summer while I was at a museum on the weekend, I noticed that the person working the counter in the bookstore, sounded like Boston.. So I struck up a conversation and asked what she had noticed to be characteristic of the beautiful Pacific NW......... She said slugs, we don't have them back home. So I said that is why every Oregonian has a dozen umbrellas. Once the rainy season begins, the wind blows the slugs out of the trees right into your hair and they stick just like chewing gum. I never cracked a smile, and told here to never cut a slug in half and walk away. I said they know how to fake you out, as soon as you walk away, they suck their guts back in, and then the tail end growes eyes and a mouth and now you have two slugs laying eggs every where.

All kidding aside, the best way to control slugs, is to keep you place imaculate. Don't allow yourself to accumulate lumber scraps that you might use someday, especialy plywood and the such . Stacks of this kind of material here in my climate, are maternity wards for slugs. Keep your moles killed off. Their underground runns are overwintering places for slugs. They hide in refuse, and in dark places. When I had ducks on my place, there weren't any slugs. The ducks earned their keep eating slugs.

We should offer a prize for the biggest stug lie. Here's one now. I went out to strech my legs and get some fresh air before bed on night, and as I stook at the end of the sidewalk, an apple fell into the back of my pickup making a gong sound. There was a large slug in the 12" culvert at the end of the sidewalk. Hearing the sound of the apple
bonginh in the truck, he came slathering out of that culvert so fast you would think he was racing all the other slugs Hiding in there. He crawled the 6' to my truck and sat up like a dog begging and flopped onto the tailgate. In no time me made it all the way to the apple, which he swallowed whole. I would never have beleived that a slug could get up to 300# unless I saw it with my own eyes. I poured a 50# bag of salt into the culvert in the morning. It took and hour and half a roll of quarters to hose the slime out of the truck . Frank

Good information, and a great yarn, as well! We don't have your banana slugs up here, so they don't reach the 300 lb. size you have noted. However, we have so many of the smaller sized slugs that I could readily come up with 300 lbs, if need be. I have tried all sorts of methods to get rid of them, including most everything mentioned in this thread, but I'm beginning to think that the best method would be consuming them. As you know, we have a tendency to deplete our natural resources by over hunting or harvesting, so why not consider slugs a resource and create a market.

To get the ball rolling, I attempted to saute a few in butter and a splash of wine, hoping for a shell-les escargot, but the salt in the butter turned them into a fluorescent green rue that tasted very much like ranacid blue cheese dressing. I've tried dipping them in chocolate, but the results were no better. I have finally settled on a delicacy that should be a good seller.... slug roe caviar! Just think of it, lovely white pearls of flavor artfully served upon rye melba! We could make it a fall special nationwide. (That's the best yarn I could think of at the moment.)

Weez, thanks for a great laugh. I am taking notes and writing down all the recipes for the day when the country is ready for the Natianal Slug Cookoff. I would like to see Emeril welcome a Chinese Cheff to demonstrate how to prepare slugs exactly the same way as a sea cucumber. Maybe a poor man's Sea Cucumber Kung Pao.

I m thinking we could have a halloween slug roundup like they used to do with rattlers in Texas. We could take 100 tons of slugs, cure them in rock salt, until they are the size of olive pits, stuff them in olives, put in some jalepeno brine, and market the olives
as JALEPENO FLAVORED OLIVES. But what to do with all the left over slime. I don't think I want to go there. But wait a minute, I just had a blinding flash, yes we sell the slime to Pharmaceuticals. every thing they make comes with side effect warnings of nausea, diareah, headaches and vomiting, and they coul sell it as a laxative.

Enough for now Frank

Frank, you are a positive gold mine of slug barnstorming! Since the slug slime is practically impossible to wash off one's hands, and since it is so sticky, how about using it for sticky note glue. We could call it 'Slug-a-Note'.

BLESS YOU Weez, but I just can;t beleive you would touch them with you hands, and get it on you. That is why I never step on them on the sidewalk. But that is just the bulls, the cows just squirt out their guts for 15 minutes or so to gag you and make you goe away so they can suck their guts back in and go on like nothing ever happened. The bulls always stick to shoe, and make you walk like something is really stuck to the bottom of your shoe, because it ISS.,, That is how they get to come in the house and then, Oh God, don't make me tell you the rest........please.. Frank Haaaappy Holloween


Frank

Weezzz, I just went out for a walk on the sidewalks, to get some fresh air, and i thought I saw a hose over the sidewalk, and it turned out to be, three bull slugs.... I stepped on them and no it is 3 oclock aan I am still tryig to get them off my slippers. Good luck, and good night. Frank

I lived in RI and we used beer to trap them. They love the tast and die happy. If you see one, sprinkle salt on it. That kills them too.
Gail

Pooooor Frank! Bulls & cows... never thought of them that way! Slug milk... perhaps another delicacy.

Linedancer, I think most of us have used beer or salt in one form or another. Both are affective, but I can't stand to look at bowls of beer-soaked slug floaters when I walk through the gardens, or watch the neighbor dogs lapping up the stuff. As for salt, better to put it in a container and drop the slugs in, as all that salt can't be good for the soil around your plants. I'm still an advocate for cutting them in half and setting out an environmentally safe slug bait.

When I lived in the San Juan Islands we were in the woods on the edge of a marsh. So many slugs the poor ducks got their beaks stuck together from eating the slimey things. Then I had to clean up the ducks.

So I resorted to a screwdriver, a big long one, first thing every morning. Walked around puncturing all the slugs. Disgusting but no chemicals. It kept things fairly manageable.

Now I live in a high dry desert climate and do not miss those buggers at all!

Oh, my! I can't imagine what you used to clean those duck beaks! If I get slug slime on my hands it is almost like trying to remove rubber cement! Maybe slugs are duck bubble gum.

Well, with five years' worth of slug experience, this looks like the thread to go to! I have had a persistent problem with delphinium that I think is probably slugs/snails. (See "Recurring problem with delphinium" in this forum.

Has anyone tried putting cans over newly emerging plants? Or around late season new growth, as found in delphiniums? That is, the can has both ends removed and is set around the plant like a collar. I've been using Sluggo a lot, but it's been a cold wet summer, and my worst affected plants are in front of a stone wall. I'm guessing the slugs and snails live there.

TIA
LAS

Success!!!! I have put cans around the "dead" delphinium, and the late regrowth is coming along great. The seedlings from nurseries that I bought on line are thriving. I do believe I have solved a problem for delphs, campanula medium and asclepius that has been plaguing me for years!!!!! Plants that I had marked as "disappeared" in August are returning, now that they're safe from the slugs. My garden is in front of a stone wall, and I'm sure hundreds/thousands of them live there.

Copper is recommended for repelling slugs, but cans seem to work just fine. I'm so excited! I did get 20' x 8" of copper at Home Depot, and it's very good for plants that have grown too large to slip a can over. I connect it with two paper clips.

Slugs work on the foliage, so the roots should be fine, as long as they get a chance to regenerate foliage. Delphinium are a favorite of slugs, as are hostas. I live in a rainy, cool summer climate, as this is a coastal Alaskan town, and slugs like it here. It must be their Miami Beach. I use Sluggo for slug control. I use it sparingly and regularly. I put it out before the slugs eat everything down, and I try to avoid places for them to snooze during the heat of the day. I want them to have to slime as far as possible before eating my plants, so I removed the bottom leaves that afford them shade, and I avoid wood chip mulches or other ground coverings they can crawl under. Your rock wall could afford them their protection, for sure.

What's the best slug trap... the best slug attractant in the world (well, maybe)?
First, a few words on the modern standards:
---SLUGGO-type killers are too expensive and don't really attract...
---COREY'S-type killers can damage plants and beneficials, and don't perform after rain like advertised... and is expensive to keep reapplying every two weeks (Western Washington State)...
---Deadline-types (liquidish stinky sludge) don't attract much and dry out...
---BEER is only useful for a couple days (my slugs sip at it and don't drown once it is stale... :), is no good diluted from rain, and is useless when it evaporates... and it's expensive!

What Works?????
BREAD!
...Pet-and-kid safe
...Doesn't damage plants
...Easy to make
...Cheap
...No chemicals
...Rain doesn't hurt it
...Slugs still like it if it dries out
...Adds to the soil nutrition
...No salt problems (especially if you make or buy salt-free)
...No salt, ammonia or Corey's damage to worms
...Bonus worm food and other beneficials (beetles and other predators)

If you put the bread next to a board, you can collect everyone in the morning.

I picked 200 slugs in two sessions within1.5 hours, and the ducks loved them!!!
That's 400% more than I get with beer or ammonia (which the ducks don't like).
The slugs were so happily filled, they were turning around to go take a nap, so I caught them just in time.
Mind you, I live near a pond with many fruit trees shading the area, so there are lots.

I'm one happy gardener tonight! :)

And the battle continues....funny how we face the same problems 11 years down the road...

Ah, but this one was very entertaining. It also reminded me that it's time to put out some Sluggo.

8-)....and beer and DE and.......