SLUGS & SNAILS
If there are two words that strike fear into the hearts of gardeners and make them drop their spades in sheer terror and rage it is Slugs and Snails. These odd wet lumps of frog like flesh are good at very few things, but one thing they do excellently is to eat large chunks of prize flowers and plants. To the amateur there seems little difference between the two apart from the fact one has a portable shelter on its back. Both like damp dark conditions and both have male and female bits, so two are not needed to tango. Being Hermaphrodites, a lonely waltz does the trick for reproduction.
- Keep your garden tidy, this will reduce the number of shady spots where they can hide out.
- Place crushed shell, eggshells, used coffee or grit around plants as neither like sliming their bodies over it. Most uncomfortable!
- Their favourite tipple is beer, place a beer trap in the garden and the binge drinkers will flock to it gasping to dive in it and die happy and drunk.
- If using nasty chemicals, USE SPARINGLY, don't nuke your garden with it, think targeted assasination. Sprinkle conservatively around prize plants.
- In every battle it helps to have allies. Hedgehogs, frogs, toads, shrews and ground beetles will all help keep snails and slugs at bay, so encourage them to visit your garden.
- Thrushes will batter the snails shells until they break up, using their beaks, provide a flat stone so they can do it properly. Battering them on grass will just give the snails a headache.
- One of the most effective ways to address the problem is a nightime ambush. Using a torch, just go round and collect them all up and either squish them underfoot or if you prefer, take your prisoners on a car journey or walk and leave them in a field a few miles from your garden, don't discard too close to home as snails tend to have in built GPS and it won't be long before you hear a slimey "Hi honey, I'm home!!!".