SLUGS. Can't live with them, can't live without them. They're busy eating the marigolds I planted last week. Slugs love marigolds. But I can't bring myself to use toxic slug killers. Slugs. Soft squishy bodies sliding across pavement like creatures from a horror film gone bad.
"Come forth into the light of things and let NATURE be your teacher." ( William Wordsworth 1770-1850)
I remember in high school we
dissected slugs. We were supposed to find effective ways to kill them .
Salt made them shrivel up.I never tried that again.
Probably the smartest thing to do is to alter your garden
WATERING SCHEDULE. Set the sprinkler system to come on between 4-9am. or toddle out there in the early hours with a hose. The earth will dry out by night. Slugs
love the night. That's when they
party, and eat things.
Like my marigolds.
It's said that pieces of
COPPER can be arranged around pots or tomatoes, or whatever you have growing. They won't crawl over the Copper. Never tried it. Sounds a bit fussy.
BEER. This is what I use. It's pretty effective. Take shells or plastic lids, set them into the dirt near where they are eating things
( like my marigolds). Then fill up with beer.The shells and the lids. Not you.
Use
beer in green houses as well. Slugs
LOVE beer. It's like you invited them to a party with an open bar, just for them. They crawl into the yeasty liquid and drown.
Don't use the non-alcoholic stuff. It doesn't seem to have the same punch.For the slugs, I mean. Long time ago I heard that if you gathered up slugs at night and put them in a pail of water, they would just float and drown overnight. Not exactly. By next morning they
vacated that pail and were back in the garden. (Eating my marigolds.)
Another great thing you can use is something called
DIATOMACEOUS EARTH. Fancy name for a dust that is basically dried up algae. You toss it onto the garden; insects and slugs will roll around in it and then wander off to die. Dehydrating. Dessimating.
Good.
It's super in a spray bottle mix of water and the dust. Spray it on
everything. Good to use when the weather is dry and there is no chance of rain. It will just wash away.
You COULD try
SALT. Get your lantern and toddle out in the dark of night. Don't step on the slugs. Take a salt shaker and sprinkle on any slugs you find.
Use it only where the plants are being eaten the most. Not a nice thing to do, by any means. But if you can't seem to deter the slugs, this
will do the trick. Just don't look. Maybe have someone go out with you and hold the lantern, or flashlight. Or better yet, just try the
BEER. On the slugs.
Not you.
Then there's
SEAWEED. If you live near the ocean and can gather it at low tide. It's great for mulching at the end of the season.
The seaweed is, of course, salty and when it dries the slugs really avoid it. When the weather turns scorching hot ( which it sometimes does these years)the seaweed will become crusty. You can later till it into the earth.
When I was little, and we would go the wild beaches of Sooke ,my mother would gather
kelp, with its long flowing "hair", and bring it back to put in the garden. I used to pretend the seaweeds were mermaids come up onto the shore. Little did they know they were destined to be slug repellent. We would lay out the kelp with their bulbous heads and flowing dreadlocks around the plants.Dried up, the "mermaids" resembled skeletons from the deep.
OVERTURNED FLOWERPOTS seem to be a drawing card for slugs. I've never had success with it. You tip up the edge of the pot with a rock, and the slugs are supposed to crawl inside. Put some grapefruit halves inside. They like the citrus apparently. Usually I find wood bugs and worms inside. And the slugs still happily eating
my marigolds.
I think a good thing to try would be
GARLIC repellents. It's potent. Garlic is
amazing and it's been known to do wonders in the garden. Don't toss around fresh garlic, look for garlic repellents at the hardware store.
COFFEE GROUNDS seem to be popular.I don't use coffee. But if I did, I would use them in conjunction with the
BEER and the GARLIC and the SEAWEED. That way you cover
all bases. Hopefully, the slugs will co-operate. If they don't like one thing, maybe they will be impressed by another repellent . One of them is bound to work.
"I loafe and invite my soul..." (Walt Whitman 1819-1892)
You could always try a
BOARD. A big old slab of wood. Slugs hide underneath the wood during the day, where they siesta and dream about eating
my marigolds.
When it is turned over, there should be slugs. If not, keep trying the
BEER. On the slugs.
Not you....
Seems that slugs don't like
LAVA Rock, or anything sharp and porous. Scatter it across the garden so it forms a barrier. Not sure how well it works. You may have to use it with all the other ideas to figure out which one works.
There's also something called an
Electronic Slug fence. Uses a battery and so forth. Never tried it. Have seen it for sale in the feed store. Much more fun putting out beer for the slugs.
Or seaweed. Or a board.
Or let the cat chase the slugs. The cat will win.
"After a debauch of thunder shower, the weather takes the pledge and signs it with a rainbow." (Thomas Bailey Aldrich 1836-1907)
So you have a ton of choices to try for slugs:
SEAWEED, a BOARD, BEER , GARLIC, DIATOMACEOUS EARTH ( DUST), SALT, LAVA,UPTURNED POTS,COPPER. Or you could just be like Spencer and simply leave the slugs be. Go nap on the porch. Go count how many slug trails you can find. It all seems so daunting. SO much work.
Yawwwwnnn. Besides, the crows and racoons will eat the slugs in the end.
Gobbling them up like soft taffy......squish squish.
(Spencer)
"None of us can find an outer place of peace, but be still. Here are the desert silences, the murmuring oceans, the wind-brushed moors, the mountain tops, all held in the centre of your being. "
(P.Brown 1928)
