Slugs and snails

[nomorespaghetti]

What do you do to get rid of these little bastards? I've tried beer traps but they crawl back out! Egg shells, coffee, hair, all didn't deter them. I've been out hunting for the sods with a wooden skewer (I do realise that makes me sound like a psycho! I'm not, honest) I've not used pellets yet because I'm worried about the impact on bees, worms and small birds. Do you use pellets? I have got copper tape around pots, but that doesn't help in my beds. Help please, they're currently destroying my clematis!

Sometimes I use pellets in the pots. It’s the only way, but never on the actual garden.

Nematodes are really good but not cheap. You have to make sure you apply them to the soil regularly but they do a great job of keeping down the population. I've now taken to planting things they don't like to eat as they were rampant in my garden. You can make collars for plants in your boarders, and apply copper tape to them.

There are organic pellets of ferric phosphate, not metaldehyde, that are fine to use.

@IlPorcupinoNilSodomyEst are these hedgehog friendly do you know?

Interesting! Thanks all. I might try the ferric phosphate first. I had heard of the nematodes, they are pricey tho!

I bought the organic Sluggo but now I've read this www.hostalibrary.org/firstlook/RRIronPhosphate.htm and I'm concerned that it will kill earthworms and other things like bees .

I do notice that the recommended application of Sluggo pellets is one level teaspoon per square yard and that supposedly the slugs bury themselves in the soil to die .So v minimal application ,and maybe toxic to earthworms but not bees .

So ....think I will confine to v minimal application on pots .

In case you don't want to plough through that link the gist of it is that Sluggo contains something toxic called EDTA
EDTA or the similar EDDS are the only reason these baits are effective, yet interestingly the label only reads Active Ingredient: Iron Phosphate - 1%, Inert Ingredients - 99%. No mention is made of the presence of another chemical that can turn harmless iron phosphate into a deadly poison. Apparently EDTA was slipped through the cracks in our regulatory system as an "inert" ingredient, and inert ingredients do not have to be listed on the label. Since iron phosphate is harmless, and EDTA is the ingredient that makes it effective, not to mention dangerous, something is really wrong here

But ...from this American thread we have the following which is attributed to Cam Wilson
Chief Technical Officer
Neudorff North America

Sluggo does contain the ingredient EDTA but it does not react with the iron phosphate to form iron chelate. Iron phosphate on its own is active. The EDTA aids in absorption of the iron phosphate in the slugs/snails gut.

The European authorities as well as the EPA and USDA's National Organics Standards Board have recently confirmed iron phosphate as the only active in Sluggo.

Sluggo can be used around animals and earthworms. Unfortunately the makes of metaldehyde, Lonza are making slanderous remarks about iron bait. They have a fear that when we are off patent in 2014 many iron baits will enter the market and their metaldehyde will be of no use. Incidentally metaldehyde is very toxic to mammals and fish and has groundwater and food residue issues. We have refuted the Lonza funded reports in each case.

Regarding the inerts: sometimes it takes years of research and millions of dollars to develop effective products. Patents are good but it doesn't help us in all cases. Trade secrets are sometimes just as valuable. The EPA and State agencies are provide with all formula information.

Hunt them day and night. If you keep your garden as tidy as possible and look in all place for them when you are out in the day and go out again at night; you’ll have some success.

But ultimately you’ll never get rid.

I’ve given up! They don’t cause me too much bother until I plant out my sunflowers and dahlias then I’ll just collect them on a late night raid. Although they were cheekily strutting across the lawn yesterday morning straight for my seedlings.

I'm another snail and slug hunter. I tend to go out at dawn (I've just come in now from a hunt) and I am ruthless. You get to know the plants they like lupins, hostas, tiger lilies, anything with tender young buds..... I also check around and inside the rims of all garden pots. Snails like hiding behind ivy strands too.

I use copper tape around pots too. I also cultivate the frogs from next door's pond....

I’ve been using wool pellets with some success around the most precious plants. , they are not cheap though!

hi

Thank you all! I did see the EDTA thing wrt the iron pellets, i think the product i was looking at stated that it didn't contain EDTA... But some reviews said that the pellets go a bit white/furry when it's wet. I am planning to get some to try out. I saw the wool pellets and they are very expensive!

Have managed to eradicate (i hope) them from a planter containing my new bedding plants (loads of the sods living inside the planter) and put copper tape around, which is working for now! But one of my clematis has been totally destroyed