Keeping slugs and snails off my seedlings 🌱

[Bigteamug]

Hi everyone

For the first time ever I have grown some seedlings on my window sill, geraniums, pansies and asters.

They will be planted in slightly raised flower beds when they are ready. Will surrounding them with gravel help stop them being eaten? I'd hate for all the TLC I've given them to be for nothing.

Thank you

Garlic wash works really well and is cheap. You do need to reapply after rain though.
https://www.siennahosta.co.uk/pages/garlic-wash-recipe

please don’t use pellets. Even the “safe” ones are not safe for wildlife. It’s better to find a way to manage and protect the stuff you want protected

Should add it was the only way we got sunflowers last year.

Other method I used that worked was beer/yeast traps but then you have to find somewhere to dump the bodies for the birds.

Garlic wash works really well and is cheap. You do need to reapply after rain though.

If you randomly water the plant with them the leaves and stems taste of garlic so don't use it on edibles.

Yeah you can work out how I know 😄

Same here.

then the squirrel decapitated it

What are good sacrificial plants for slugs?

I don't understand the principle of planting sacrificial plants. If slugs love them then the little bastards thrive, multiply and move on to the plants supposedly being protected!!
And if they dont like them they choose the others any way.
All I know is that almost every plant I've ever bought gets sacrificed to slugs 😡
I'm almost resigned to having a garden of perennial geraniums, bluebells and Japanese anemones only as these are the only things that survive 🤨
I adore irises and have had to put them in pots on a table because the leaves are already like lace. My daffodils are shredded before blooming, hellibores demolished and these are around a pond full of frogs!!
Gravel, coffee grains, egg shells etc. deter none of them. I nightly collect a pot full and dump in the park at the bottom of the road next day.
I spent a fortune on nematodes over the last few years in the hope I could reduce the numbers to a more balanced ecosystem but no - slugs return in their hundreds.
But I will try the garlic wash this year as well and 🙏 that will help.
Good luck !

Our "lovely" squirrels waited until the seeds were ripe...

I second waiting until the pants are a decent size. Don’t bother with French marigolds, they are like crack cocaine to slugs. I’ve put a sand barrier around the cold frame in the hope that they won’t like the sharp sand all up in their personal slime 🤣

I'll have you know my pants are a decent size already,thank you very much!