Thursday, July 14, 2011

Slug Control . . . Home Remedies




You can have gorgeous flowering plants one day and wake up the next morning to nothing but sticks.  Slugs will do that!


After lots of experimenting, I found many different methods of getting rid of them . . .


Best method . . . purchased organic slug bait and put in jars with holes in the lid . . . placed sideways in areas plagued by the slugs.  The method is similar to a roach motel . . . they check in, but don't check out.  Be careful using baits if you have pets . . . even if they are organic, they can be toxic to pets.  Placing them in jars keeps the pets out of the bait.


Slugs hate scratchy barriers like crushed eggshells, wood ash and coffee grounds . . . they can be used as barriers around infested areas.  It is a tedious process and requires reapplication after rain or watering.


It is said that copper strips shock slugs and snails trying to cross them, although I never tried it.  Thin copper can be found in craft stores.


There are effective baiting techniques!  Lure them and then kill them in soapy water.  Another tedious process, but they will gather away from your plants to a confined area where you can easily dispose of them.


They love beer . . . set out in jar tops at night, collect them and dispose in the morning . . . they also love dissolved yeast.


Set out fresh melon rinds and grapefruit at night . . . lures them in just like the beer does.


The baiting techniques can be a problem in you have pets!


We haven't had a problem with slugs . . . it is the grasshoppers that are eating everything in sight.  The only way I've found to effectively get rid of them without using pesticides is catch them and stomp them dead.  I hate them!


Share your home remedies for controlling pests in your garden!



2 comments:

Petronela said...

We don't have problems with slugs here but we do detest potato bugs. I don't plant too many potatoes, just a few, because of these disgusting bugs. I used a lot of things but...no effects.

Tomas said...

First line of your post caught my eye and captivated me at a glimpse - it knocked on the heart like metaphor - I hoped to get some proposal/advice on dealing with the personal disabilities... Our sickness so often force to see ourself as the sticks, the victims of the slugs attack (you may read about their life on Modus Vivendi pages)
I didn't find art therapy here, but enjoy your post greatly. While reading further my interesat was doubled and I understood that your practical advices were of much higher value than the beauty of the abstract musings. You taught us how to care for our plants and that was the real art therapy that will bloom forth in the pictures of our grateful flowers.
I enjoyed your post. Hope to receive your constructive comments on art by Tomas for I could improve my blog. Thank you in advance.

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