5 tips for combating slugs in the garden:
Monitor – check for slugs in the garden every day
shiny-slug
Cultivate – aggressive cultivation, like digging or rotovating the garden soil, kills slugs & blocks their movements
fork
Prepare good seedbed - a fine, well consolidated seedbed is not a good home for slugs
firm-soil-down
Sow seeds deeper – sowing at 4cm rather than 2 or 3cm makes it harder for slugs to attack germinating vegetable plants
black-slug-on-cabbage
Put out slug traps to catch the slugs & pick them off when seen
cabbage&slug-trap
Comments Off
Befruitful has commented: Have used coffee grounds extensively this year to deter slugs. They worked well for a time, but then didn’t work any longer. I can’t make out whether that was because of caking, making it easier to crawl over or because the smell had faded, or some other reason. What do you think?
shiny-slug
TopVeg replied:
Hi Befruitful
Thanks for feeding back to TopVeg on your experience with coffee grounds.
I am sure it is because of the caking – slugs don’t seem to like crawling over dry powder or grit. If I can’t find any soot (much preferred solution!) I put a ring of very fine gravel round my plants. It is amazing how it keeps them off.
Happy growing!
TopVeg
slime-trail
Have other vegetable gardeners found that coffee grounds deter slugs?
Comments Off
Everyone wants to crack on in the vegetable garden in March, as the birds begin to sing and the days get longer – but the ground is still cold, and will be until it dries up. So don’t go mad and sow all your seeds – just put a few in and leave the rest until the soil has dried out.
- Sow:
early beetroot, carrots, lettuce, radish,spring onions, perpetual spinach directly into the ground
- peas & broad beans in pots
- celery in trays on warm window sill & keep moist
- leeks in a tray to thin later and leave under glass
- plant onion sets, garlic, Jerusalem artichokes & shallots if not already in
- plant early potatoes as soon as the ground is dry enough
Crop:
Finish harvesting cabbages, leeks, parsnips, kale and sprouting broccoli.
Other jobs:
- mulch soft fruits with organic matter
- lift mint every 2 years & divide
- hoe weeds regularly before they get too big
- be on constant alert for slugs
Comments Off
This very long slug posed along side a ruler this morning – and almost
reached 6 inches!
6-inch-slug
The warm, humid weather is ideal for slugs and there is plenty of food
for them in the vegetable garden.
cabbage&slug-trap
Comments Off
This is a bad year for slugs on strawberries.
slug-damage-on-strawberry
The slug population has exploded in the ideal conditions provided by the wet conditions last summer & this spring.
To reduce slug attacks on strawberries:
* surround the strawberry row with oyster grit, or a similar medium,
which the slugs do not like to cross.
* place ’slug pubs’ amongst the rows. These are small containers of
beer which the slugs drop in to.
* leave grapefruit or orange skins in the row, which will attract
slugs, & pick the slugs out every day & destroy.
* purchase a pyramid slug trap
* elevate the strawberry plants on poles which the slugs cannot
climb – see table top strawberries.
* click the link for more info on slug control
slug-eaten-strawberry
Slugs can devastate the strawberry crop, so it is worth taking time to
control the slugs, using a number of different methods.
Slugs love this wet weather. In the evening, all shapes and sizes of slugs appear in the vegetable garden.
They are all colours – white, black, striped and so on.
black-slug-on-cabbage
This large black slug was busy shredding a cabbage leaf.
slug-on-cabbage
Slugs belong to the phylum of molluscs, in the class Gastropoda, which
are soft-bodied invertebrate animals.
Slugs are related to snails, but do not have a shell. All slugs have a
protective coat of slime and a distinctive head with protruding
tentacles, which have eyes at the end. The tentacles are used to smell
and locate food. Slugs eat plants so they are a great pest in the
vegetable garden; some species are carnivorous and eat other slugs,
snails, and earthworms.
Slugs need moist conditions, which is why they multiply in the wet season.
Comments Off
Watch out for slugs, and control them in the vegetable garden!
* Slugs eat young seedlings and will completely destroy your plans.
* Slugs like warm, moist conditions. So this spring has been perfect
for them.
* Assume you will have slugs and be prepared.
a-slug
*Keep the vegetable garden tidy.
* Slugs will make camp under anything:- weeds, old leaves &
branches, stones & plant pots, soil clods.
* So remove all potential hideouts.
* Keep the soil raked, so that it is small crumbs and no clods.
Think biological control:
* hedgehogs will fight the battle for you
* guinea fowl & other birds help
* dry, fine dusty material sticks to the slug & turns them away. Put
a ring of soot around the seedlings
* rosemary needles deter slugs
* small cups of beer dropped into the ground act as traps
If all else fails invest in some slug pellets to control slugs in the garden.
