Home alone, no salt, slugs in my kitchen

[Jupitertomars]

Posting for traffic. I hate hate hate slugs. Few weeks ago walked into kitchen to find an enormous slug in middle of kitchen. OH put it outside

Yesterday found one as I was hanging out washing between clothes.

Tonight seen one emerging from my kitchen kickboard.

I am literally shaking I hate them.

What do i do

Do you have any beer? Drink a sip then put the rest out for the slugs. They will drown happy.

This was the original one I found over a month ago.

Oh dear god Super I don't think I am going to sleep tonight! (Plotting move to an upper floor flat)

I am a big animal lover, I rescue spiders when my friends get scared, but slugs and snails freak me the fuck out and I'm choosing to believe AssassinatedBeauty, and use the salt (even though I do feel a bit of guilt)**

I opened my gate once and put my hand on one a few years back when I was in my own, no amount of bleachand wine will ever stop me associating the Queen's diamond jubilee weekend with that!

Sorry OP, I'm freaking out on your behalf rather than helping but a quick google says that coffee should help.

However you really need to find the source of those pesky things. Do you have any animals that might have brought them in? Are there any gaps in outside doors etc

It was raining really heavily one night as I was coming in from the car, and I stupidly the front door open while I was getting my things in from the car.

Later that night, I went back into the porch in the dark (again, stupid) to pick up my bag, and one of the slimy fuckers (a particularly huge one) was on top of it

Or tempt in some local wildlife...all you seem to need is a ceramic toad house

Spiders have multiple hundreds of thousands of neurons, in a proper brain. They are geniuses compared to slugs, so probably ought to be removed rather than squished.

Move. Get on the phone to the estate agent first thing. Send your DH out to Tesco's for salt right now - you stay at home and keep watch incase it slimes itself off somewhere else. Big hairy spiders I can live with but slugs noooooooooooooooooo!

See I find spiders fascinating and my DH happens to know someone who has made spiders his life's work. Apparently he has written quite a few books about them. Yet so many people seem to be terrified of them, I wonder why. I find the origins of phobias quite fascinating (geek!)

Slugs and snails react to painful stimuli so I think it is really quite ridiculous to claim that they definitely do not feel pain!

There's often one in my kitchen late at night. Never there in the morning. I sometimes pick them up with kitchen paper and throw them out of the window.

They don't have anything to feel with, they have a countable number of neurons that each do a specific function to do with moving, feeding and simple decision making. They don't have any kind of a brain to feel with.

My mum came to the rescue with beer. It has disappeared but hopefully will be drawn to the beer and any others hiding.

Will update in the morning.

In my blind ignorance and horror I am clinging on to @AssassinatedBeauty's superior knowledge

Woke up and there's no slugs in the beer. So theres one, possibly more still in my kitchen

Sorry Jupiter. I've put beer out in my garden (where my slugs have the decency to stay) & they've drowned.

Did you put it in a low-sided container? I guess they can climb a bit, but I aim to reduce the struggle.

You should catch them and put in a plastic container in the fridge. When you have a decent number, dip in batter and deep fry. Lovely with a bit of tartar sauce.

I put the beer in a range of glasses, some pint and some smaller tumbler sized.

Will try again tonight with a smaller container.

When this happened to me in my mum's cottage I had to put non-see through containers over them and wait a day or so until my mum came to move them outside. (I was younger than I am now...but not very young). I hate anything without legs. My mum put polyfiller in the skirting board which was how they were getting in. Seemed to solve it well for a few years but the kitchen there is falling apart now so last time we stayed there my husband was slug remover in the morning.

You need something fairly shallow so it's very easy to get in, like a plastic take away tub or similar.

Please don't use slug pellets in the garden. They harm other animals as well as slugs ( hedgehogs for example)

Hope you catch your unwanted house guest.

We had slugs in the kitchen once. They were hiding behind the baseboards. We pulled the baseboards off and they were there they all were on the back. When you have help, get someone to take a look.

In the meantime leave the lights on. They don't like to come out into the light.

They can't feel pain. No brain, no central nervous system. The reaction you see when you prod or salt them isn't a pain response, it's just a physical reflex - even plants react to stimuli but it doesn't mean they feel anything.

I don't pour salt on them myself though because it's messy and horrid. I do, however, occasionally sprinkle a line of salt along the gaps where slugs occasionally get into my house (under the front door and from under the floor of our extension) and this seems to deter them - I've never found a melted slug but it just seems to put them off. I'm not scared of them as such but I do find them gross and obviously don't want them trailing over my house.

Slug pellets aren't a good idea. They are an absolute menace to other wildlife and also, not actually that effective at dealing with slugs.

I'm told that slugs can be attracted by other slugs' trails, so make sure you scrub where they've been, ideally with something that has a strong chemical scent to obliterate any traces.

Spray them with ammonia/water from a spray bottle, they dissolve into jelly. I hate slugs and have researched ways of killing them, my family say I am obsessed. Or just stamp on it very very hard and it will explode.