Poorly Pokers

Our usually lovely red hot pokers seem to be not at all well this year, maybe it's all the heavy rain we've had lately. The emerging flower heads looked badly eaten and deformed but the stems looked ok at first but now they look awful, any ideas please?

 

Yes hungry molluscs, encouraged by the mild wet winter.
My early flowering one has also suffered. Kniphofias always support a population of snails.

 

Would this account for the stems appearing to rot?

 

yes its the slugs , the stem is hollow then it doesnt grow straight rot sets in with the nibbling

 

Thanks Nigel, very helpful.

 

Thanks, those pesky slugs, wait till I catch them

 

With mine its snails, they get down in the leaves and are impossible to get out.

 

I was hoping the slugs and snails would be fewer since the hedgehogs returned, there must just be too many for them.

 

I've said it before, can someone prove to me that hedgehogs eat slugs.

Nothing eats slugs IMO, apart from I once saw a crow trying to wipe the slime off of one, presumably before eating it, it gave up and left the dead slug on the ground.

 

They [slugs] only form a small part of a hedgehog's diet - same with frogs, but it can help if the slug population isn't too high.

 

@pete I once saw my tortoise eat a small slug that was trying to eat his lettuce, it took him a few bites but he got it down. Every little helps!

 

I thought tortoises were vegetarian.

 

Apparently they sometimes eat carrion in the wild but this slug was definitely alive! Obviously nobody told Graham and the slug was eating his lettuce so paid the price. I wish I had filmed it because it’s pretty unbelievable. Graham is very small but so was the slug, about 3cms and very pale cream.

 

Graham it's a good name.

 

Has any one tried dried chilli flakes or chopped up fresh chillies as a slug and snail deterrent?. Never tried it but did read it somewhere. I bought a couple of bags of that straw that is supposed to stop slugs and snails in their tracks but never worked.