ARRRGGGHHHHHHHH - SLUGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ah! Just answered my own question by looking in FAQ. Must be disabled in this forum. Could be done from General gardening discussion. Are you volunteering to set it up, Hornbeam? :D

 

Hi Hornbeam, you may have just hit the nail on the head there when you said that slugs/snails like native plants. My garden backs on to a grazing paddock where a large patch of nettles has increased over the years and now runs the whole length of my garden, maybe this is the reason that I don't have a problem, the little b*****ers are getting enough to eat elsewhere.

 

Could well be so and nettles are also essential for butterflies as so many of their caterpillars like a good meal of nettles too.

"Nature is a web - break one strand and you weaken all of the others". Who said that?

 

My idea for what it's worth (probably not a lot :D ) is that snails have a little mobile home and therefore need a souce of calcium for their shells.

I've noticed that up here, (acid soils) snails seem to confine their activity around walls and in some gardens it's unusual to find any snails whilst slugs have the run of the gardens. On non acid soils (chalk, limestone) snails will predominate.

As I said it's just a conjecture so feel free to blast it out of the (salt) water, drown me in a beer trap (oooh - PLEASE), whop me with sticky-goo gel or even fire blue pellets at me from out'o'a pop gun (but give me a good head start first) :D

 

...bet I'll beat you to the beer trap, hic!!!!!

 

Do cloches not do much good in stopping slugs, then???

 

timecharger:

Yes and no. Cloches will not keep slugs out but you can control the environment better and keep out birds and frogs etc. so there is less risk from using slug pellets. They tend to last longer as they are not washed out by rain.

Most cold frames and greenhouses also have gaps where a marauding slug can get in and it's always possible to have slug eggs in compost so it's wise to have some measure of protection.