Grow your own

[Powertothepetal]

I’m struggling

The slugs/snails keep eating my kale, brocolli, Basil, coriander, Dill and parsley.

The butterflies got my mustard and my rocket last year.

The birds ate my cherries.

Everytime I try and grow chocolate mint it transforms into an alive but really ugly leggy plant and loses all its bushyness.

How on earth do people do this?!

I will net the cherries next year, I have put the rocket in a box on the wall and touch wood it’s undamaged so far but the slugs/snails, how do I deter them?!

I have always been dead set against poisoning/killing creatures but I am beginning to feel like if I don’t put poison down I am literally never going to be able to grow anything aside from woody Mediterranean herbs and tree fruit.

How did people do this in the ‘olden days’ when everyone had a cottage garden growing flowers and edibles?!?!
Presumably they didn’t have access to pellets...?

I had some success with wood ash as they don’t like sliding over the stuff , and also bought some sheep’s wool in pellets I think that slowed them down. But I must confess to the poison pellets in town when I only had a courtyard garden and the slugs were brutal. There are some now that say it doesn’t poison the birds which were my main concern so I used that. I think it was called sluggo.
For the mint, give it a Chelsea chop and it’ll grow back bushy.
Back in the day they used terrible chemicals, also had quarter acre plots so grew enormous quantities and probs chickens to eat up the slugs. If you have room for a small pond , the frogs and toads will eat a lot of the evil little bastards.

We have a visiting hedgehog that seems to be keeping the slug and snail population under control.

Wood ash, i’ll look into that thank you.
Would just plain sheared unwashed sheep fleece do as I remember buying that before off eBay very cheaply...

I've order some nemaslug from gardening-naturally (one of the few places it's in stock). It's microscopic worms that you water into the soil. They attack slugs (but not snails) and after the slugs have died it's safe for birds to eat them. There's another version for fruit and veg called nemasys which has a blend of different nematodes for (copying and pasting here) carrot root fly, cabbage root fly, leatherjackets, cutworms, onion fly, ants, sciarid fly, caterpillars, gooseberry sawfly, thrips, and codling moth.

Last year I bought some ladybirds for aphid control and despite worrying half of them had flown away, this year there were loads of larvae and later ladybirds around my roses and dahlias keeping the aphids in check.

Recently done Horticultural courses, and then also heard this on gardeners World, you need some cheap sacrifical plants for the pests, something you don't mind being eaten, also search companion plants... these are plants you can grown near your crops that deter pests.
Organic gardening is all about balancing the pests with predators, and smart gardening.

You will never eliminate problems 100% using organic methods, but you can control damage smartly, by using information and planting smart.

Good luck!

Organic gardening is all about balancing the pests with predators, and smart gardening
You will never eliminate problems 100% using organic methods, but you can control damage smartly, by using information and planting smart
Frustratingly, this has always been my view but it actually doesn’t seem to work very well in my experience!

Both my front and back garden are biodiverse with a huge variety of plants, I have a pond too (in both gardens), and a stumpery.

Many times I have tried to grow a slug loved plant, like delphiniums, or hosta, or chrysanthemum, tucked away around plants slugs allegedly hate and they still get them and ruin them.
I have also tried growing in drier, hotter areas of the garden where you wouldn’t expect slugs to be as often and I’ve tried morning watering to no avail.

Ultimately there are a large range of flowering plants that I have just plain given up trying to grow now as it’s just money down the drain.

I don’t want to give up trying to edible garden, I’d really love some fresh vegetables to eat!

We have raised beds. With gravel paths around the raised beds. With copper bands around edges. Haven’t had anything eaten by slugs this year so far.

Ultimately there are a large range of flowering plants that I have just plain given up trying to grow now as it’s just money down the drain. That's a sensible approach. My cousin used to have an even longer list, this time of plants she couldn't grow because of rabbits.

It takes a few years of mayhem before the predators arrive. It's worth sticking it out. Unfortunately there aren't many reliable predators of slugs - a slug is food of last resort for thrushes, frogs, hedgehogs. If you have somewhere that you can keep slug-free, eg a greenhouse, it's worth starting everything in there. Slugs like tender young shoots, so grow things hard in the greenhouse to a reasonable size before putting them out.

Veg that are less troubled by slugs - chard, broad beans, peas, radishes until the "shoulders" burst through the surface of the soil, beetroot, bush and cane fruit, lambs lettuce, anything in the cabbage family. Chives, Mediterranean herbs.

If started in a greenhouse and put out when several feet high, runner and climbing french beans.

Alpine strawberries, and ordinary strawberries if you grow them in pots and keep the fruit off the ground, and pick just before fully ripe.

For my allotment, I start my vegetable seeds off in the greenhouse until they are big enough to cope with a bit of slug damage. Around my strawberry plants I use a product called Stulch. It is a mulch/ weed suppressant and apparently slugs don't like it either. I also use copper tools which apparently helps to deter slugs.

I have no room for a greenhouse 😔
Only have my windowsills!

I have a huge slug population as well as many visiting cabbage white butterflies. I try to net brassicas against the butterflies (some plants not netted due to their position have been infested and I was out earlier squashing caterpillars 🤮). If you can't net them this seems to be the main defence - and also there is an organic biological solution called nemasys that you spray on, but it's a bit pricey for me.

I have found some success with copper collars, plastic collars that bend over and downwards again, and strong cooled coffee sprayed all over the plants. If you can get the young plants over the seedling stage then they can usually bounce back from both slug and butterfly attacks.

Food plants which I grow that slugs leave alone pretty much: tomatoes, courgettes and squash, Chinese artichoke, onions, garlic, chives, sorrel, French sorrel, beetroot, kohlrabi, turnips.

But I feel your pain, and growing your own: the reality is less idyllic than my idea of it before I started.

I have managed to grow some very slug vulnerable plants successfully this year by planting them in a mixed bed with some hardy geraniums, Japanese anemones and leucanthemums. This bed is also next to my pond - though I've not noticed any frogs in the pond this year. I've no idea is the success is random or connected to the plant mix and/or location.

I think there will always be some things that work out and others than just don't - tis the nature of the beast. I have a hell of a lot of respect for farmers since starting to grow my own!