Bastard slugs

[SilverSixpence]

Any ideas on what to do about them?? They've eaten two lupins, all the sunflowers I planted with ds and two squash plants

I don't want to kill birds and hedgehogs with pellets and am not touching the damn things either!

Just crack open the slug pellets - they are not actually harmful to wildlife and are 1) blue so they are not attractive to wildlife; and 2) contains something to make them bitter and therefore unpalatable; and 3) the active ingredient is in very small concentrations so harmful to slugs and not much else.

In all the years I have used them, I've never seen anything other than a slug or snail affected by them.

Wowfudge... I am going to try the slug pellets too now you've written that... 50% of my shop bought veg plants have been ravished by the slugs and I've been worried about putting down the pellets for fear of my cat eating them.

Seriously - I have always used them because the damage slugs and snails cause is terrible. We had a cat for many years - she never showed any interest in slug pellets (she went to the big cat basket in the sky last year - not because of slug pellets, I hasten to add!) and we have NDN's cats playing in our garden now, plus squirrels, etc, loads of birds. A big tub of pellets lasts us several years.

If you have children or children play in your garden, then obviously educate them not to pick up slug pellets or try to eat them.

Beer traps work, but seem a terrible waste of beer unless you can get slops from your pub. Copper rings are great and you can DIY them with sticky copper tape round slices of plastic bottles.

Grow stuff they don't like so much. Lupins and sunflowers are their favourites.

Winner I didn't know that's what the slugs were doing to the plants: all the more reason to kill 'em with pellets. Think you mean ravaged

Beer traps. I use sainsburys basics beer (£1 for 4 IIRC) , set margarine tubs into the ground and pour the beer in. I only have a small garden but so far the most I've needed is 5 x 4 packs over a month. After that slugs stopped appearing, I'd wiped them out for that summer .

Just hold your nose when you dispose of them, I pop the dead slug sludge in my compost bin < boak>.

If you are worried about wildlife, you could put a tile or flat stone over the slug pellets, as the slugs will still get at them but other animals won't.

I have used baked and crunched-up eggshells as a barrier to keep molluscs off hostas, but the best thing has been the liquid stuff (Slug Clear) that you water on. It can't, though, be used on crops.

Just leave a few empty beer cans in your garden overnight. In the morning they will be stuffed full of slugs. (shudders at the memory)

Then you can dispose of them as you see fit.

Yes to beer traps. Don't buy it though, go down your local with a bucket and ask for the dregs.

I use organic slug pellets which are not harmful to pets, children, wildlife etc.

If you need to cover a small area then nematodes work but they are expensive.

And get out there in the dark armed with a torch and a bucket of hot soapy water- that's a good way to get them.

My tarragon has survived this year, it must be the 4th one I've bought!

Ha! My slugs were obviously mega brutal!!!

Same here. I have heavy clay soil that never, ever dries out so there are millions of slugs here. I gave up on hostas and lupins ages ago. I still grow sunflowers but I have to plant 3 times as many seeds as I want plants.

Just crack open the slug pellets - they are not actually harmful to wildlife and are 1) blue so they are not attractive to wildlife; and 2) contains something to make them bitter and therefore unpalatable; and 3) the active ingredient is in very small concentrations so harmful to slugs and not much else.

Erm...they also contain slug attractants thus attracting slugs to your garden. Esp when people out several hundred down at once. Even the manufacturer says one every 4 inches is enough.

And I know of people whose cats and dogs ate the pellets and didn't make it through. I know about them because after that they did their research and decided to go organic as they were mortified they killed their own animal. The danger isn't always in the animals eating the pellets but eating the slugs that had pellets in or attached to them.

OP - there are a myriad of other slug prevention measures that won't kill other lifeforms, how about trying those first before 'cracking open the slug pellets?'

One of the main factors is having too neat gardens, with no ponds that can house frogs and other slug eaters; if you don't give them any cover they won't come out and eat your slugs in the first place. A pond and some cover for frogs will work magic in your garden to control the slug population.

Try a sprinkling of Saxo! Bad for humans, deadly for slugs!

Funky my garden is tiny, about 20 foot if that! So no space for a pond sadly. I will look into organic slug pellets though I have seen them in the local nursery

Nemaslug works well, love the thought of tiny nematodes whizzing through the soil on a search and destroy mission
I've got a small garden, pack costs £11 and so far we've only needed to use it once a year, in spring, although its recommended to use it in autumn as well. Don't see how slug pellets, beer traps etc help. Surely they just entice more slugs into the garden?

Well Funky I have never had such a problem in many years of gardening and having pets. Lily pollen is poisonous to cats and I've had lilies in the house many, many times and cats have never shown any interest.

Funky that is interesting - I wondered why there were so many snails and slugs in the garden ATM, must be all the slug pellets I put down. We have a small London garden and no room for a pond either.

That's funny, I've noticed a definite decrease in slugs since I started using the pellets. How far do slugs travel? I mean they're not very fast, are they.

For a pond you can just leave out a tray of water...we have ponds at our community garden but at my allotment I have a few trugs and pots with no holes in, I leave them to collect water [that I use in times of extreme drought] and usually have a frog or two that finds them and lays frogspawn in them each spring. By the time the tadpoles are gone [and most of them will be eaten by other tadpoles] I just use the water and it fills up again next winter.

Funky surely the attractants work to entice the nearby slug to eat the pellets rather than the plants? Your post suggests that using slug pellets brings slugs into your garden. They must have one hell of a sense of smell if that's the case.

Beer traps!
We put some out earlier in the week and we've got about 15+ caught already.

Funky surely the attractants work to entice the nearby slug to eat the pellets rather than the plants? Your post suggests that using slug pellets brings slugs into your garden. They must have one hell of a sense of smell if that's the case.

Once you have killed all the slugs in your garden with your pellets, where do the others come from?

We're going for slug pellets in the greenhouse (they keep going for DHs toms but thankfully don't seem to bother with mine & DSs so we're winning ) I can the dispose of dead slugs/snails so they don't get in the food chain.
Outside we have just put in beer traps and grapefruit skins and we do a before bedtime sweep with DS (he's getting a rate of 2p a snail/slug) and it seems to be making an impact on the veggies although my lobelia are all gone.

Caught 20 slugs and 2 snails in 3 traps last night. Digging over a plot for some of the greenhouse seedlings has found me 10 more! Have just sent DH out for more beer.

There's slug pellets and slug pellets. The cheap stuff is bad for the whole food chain. I try to get these kind which are a bit better - break down more easily.

That said you only use them lightly, or they will build up too I think. I use them mostly in spring, once plants are more established they resist damage more (and slugs run away in high summer).

I did try the old beer trap trick, which works very well but can start to eat up your finances even with cheap beer, depending on size of area to cover!