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Slugs. Do little. Too late.

G

Guest

If you had a slug problem this year, & its warm & wet now, maybe time to think ahead about slug control. Slugs are hermaphroditic, & can lay an awfull lot of eggs, up to 40,000 offspring, control now could really make a difference next spring. Slugs are active at temps above 4-6 degrees, they will lay eggs untill the temps drop below this. In cold conditions the eggs will lie there for up to 3-4 months,or untill the weather warms up.You could start by monitoring the situation, lay a few plastic bags down in likely areas., with a few clods ontop. If you see slugs now, get some pellets down. Place them under the same plastic sheets away from birds. Farmers with slug sensitive crops, potatoes, lettuce etc, will often apply pellets in the autumn if it is WARM & WET. Disrupt their breeding cycle NOW, & it could make a huge impact.
Heres a list of things that may help.

Clear your grow area of old pots, rocks, tiles, planks etc places where they hide & lay eggs.
Clear out that old garden pond, so migrating toads will have somewhere to breed in the spring. They will eat lots of slugs.
Give hedgehogs somewhere to over winter. Old bonfires are favourite. They will eat lots of slugs.
Get some nest boxes up, not just tit boxes with the little hole in front, but letterbox style ones, for blackbirds & thrushes. They will eat lots of slugs, & so will their young. Make sure they are high eneogh off the ground, or you may be feeding the cat!

Pray for a really hard cold frosty winter.

Anyone with more ideas, lets hear, what say ya!
 
Gantz

Gantz

Smoke weed and prosper
Veteran
i just make it hard for the lil buggers to get to the plants.
copper works so i make rings of cable wire and cut some of the cable so that you have a ring of spikes in all directions. i put the ring at the base of the plant. i'd like to see a snail try to drag its body on that...
on the same idea anything sharp could be used. i've heard of people using crushed seashells
 
esbe

esbe

hybridsfromhell
Mentor
Veteran
rite bro, also a double beer can fence can protect a single plant

good stuff farmaz bro, i expect lost of slugs again next season. and you are right, only thing that really gets those bastards is very hard and long frosts. but global warming very rare gives us that anymore. another good animal to have is the mosk duck, looks like this
JCS%20Cairina%20moschata%2023596.jpg


these are also good, make nests for them
pindsvin.jpg
 
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G

Guest

A whole family of seriously spiny serial slug killers!, hope you train them young, put milk & sugar on the slugs, reward them well with the odd garlic snail & chocolate egg. "Go kill, kill slugs, my little spikenards"
 
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Sammet

Sammet

Med grower
ICMag Donor
Veteran
In the bottom right hand corner of the bottom photo you can see the victims shells littering the hedgepiglets lair :D
 
G

Guest

Perfect, we could gaffer tape the hedgehogs down, forcing them to watch video images of slugs at 100 frames /second whilst playing heavy metal satanic rock music through little ipod earphones at them, turning them psychotic, making a whole new generation of killer baby hedgehogs, waiting for a signal, before launching themselves at the unsuspecting slimeballs. Mentally mad Molluscian Candidates.
Disclaimer:
If there are any animal rights activists out there, or Sir Paul Mc Cartney, get well soon. :muahaha:
 
V

vod

i'm thinking of a way to save my guerilla plants from slugs next year. (this year they took out 5 of them)
apart from protection in number of plants i can't think about anything practical. i don't want to chuck poison in the forest.
maybe a little copper wire here and there, but does it really work?
i read something about coffe, how it stops the heart of the slug. did anyone try this method? but i'm sure i'd have to apply the coffe more often that it's possible for me.
 
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V

vod

ah! thank you very much.

that nemaslug looks interesting indeed. need to look for a source localy. don't like to buy everything over the internet.
 
esbe

esbe

hybridsfromhell
Mentor
Veteran
i tried nematods, didnt work notibally, iron sulfit 1% is much better and can be made very cheap by yourself
 
G

Guest

hedgehog?! oh yes my last season keeper :D Many times saw this funny dude at my plot...many times scared me a lot :)


:wave:
 
V

vod

hi esbe!

can you tell me a little bit more about iron sulfit 1%? how to apply, how it works, how to prepare?

i found nematodes for 20euro a pack (for 40sqm). quite a bit of money. i also read a bit how to use them. did you stick with the instructions they give and still had no noticable effect? what brand did you use?
 
Sammet

Sammet

Med grower
ICMag Donor
Veteran
Vod, the iron sulphite will work pretty much 100%, but I don't like using chemicals etc (I grow organic). So my suggestion of the nematoads is not super fix, but will control the numbers enough so that they won't hurt your crop hopefully.

Curious to hear more about the fe2so4 (that right?) too, esbe :D
 
esbe

esbe

hybridsfromhell
Mentor
Veteran
prober use of iron sulfit does not affect the naturel invironment, nor harm any animals but the enemy

i just bought pure iron sulfit(costs nothing) and mixed it with the slug bait, wish could be pasta, rich, wheed, nudles etc 1 to 100, sometimes a lil more, the recipie i got from a 1 kg 50 dollar pack of commercial iron sulfit product against slugs. i just read the ingrediences and copyed it. in my gardens i need maby 15 kilos so i thought it would be more fun to do it myself
 
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V

vod

a! thank you very much. that sounds good. let's see if i can find the iron sulfit.
got one more question: how to apply? how much for how big a space would you use?
 
esbe

esbe

hybridsfromhell
Mentor
Veteran
actually iron sulfit is in the stuff you fert green grass with to make it healcy, but you can easily buy as only iron sulfit. i had good experience with cerial. you just make a 1-2% mix in water and then add the cerial so it suchs up all the water. now you have the iron sulfit in the cerial and can spread it so it covers the whole place. just add enough and see if it helps. to test it, get a slug and see what happens after its been eating it. the slug should die after a day or two
 
G

Guest

Thanks Esbe for the Iron info, sounds good! I think iron sulphide is sold as moss killer on lawns. Rather than spreading about, maybe a few small piles under bags might be better, less chance of birds picking it up, even if it harmless. Also slugs will continue feeding under a bag during daytime, rather than coming out at night only. Personally stepping the rate up to 5-10 %, its the same ratio of poison in pellets. If you use porridge oats slugs love them, you could soak with stale beer as well, twice as nice. You should find dead slugs under the plastic after 2 days. Black Bin liners work well. Its dark & damp.
 
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