Organic (non-beer) slug control

[boggybranch]

I do a lot of research on UK allotment blogs and picked this little tib-bit up off of one. They usually use slug pellets to combat slugs (a VERY big problem in the UK). Last year slug pellets were banned because they contained an ingredient used in making bombs. So they started sprinkling wheat bran around the areas visited by slugs. The slugs would eat the wheat bran and "dry up like sticks". Not as fast a remedy as slug pellets but, reportedly, just as effective. It does need to be replenished after rain.

[Ozark Lady]

Wheat bran... that sounds likely!

I also have heard of using cornmeal in the garden, I guess that is also for slug control.

Maybe a buffet, wheat bran, cornmeal, diatomaceous earth, and wood ashes, and circle the plants... and top it all with egg shells... ha ha

[boggybranch]

Wheat bran... that sounds likely!

I also have heard of using cornmeal in the garden, I guess that is also for slug control.

Maybe a buffet, wheat bran, cornmeal, diatomaceous earth, and wood ashes, and circle the plants... and top it all with egg shells... ha ha

Hahahahaha....now that's what you call "covering all the bases". It'd take a determined bionic slug to get past all of that.]

[Toil]

I got tons of wheat bran. thanks!

[GardenJester]

try placing couple of empty overturned plant pots in your garden. The slugs would crawl under it to take shelter from the sun in the morning. All you have to do is turn over the pots during the day with a salt shaker in hand.

[The Helpful Gardener]

I've heard of the pots but find an old board even easier; leave them in the rows...

The body count really mounts up with that much space to hide...


Yep, beer is an old and unsuitable method; why would I want to call all the slugs from a hundred yards into my garden? Get your neighbor to use beer...

HG

[Toil]

It's more for me, but when I see slugs on plants I like to pick them off with chopsticks and impale them on BBQ skewers, for all the other slugs to see.

[The Helpful Gardener]

Sort of a Lord of The Slugs approach, toil...?



HG

[GardenJester]

ah... Toil the slug impaler of... new haven? have you considered moving to some place with a more ominous sounding name? some place that ends with ...vania, like pennsylvania.

[applestar]

Definitely trying the wheat bran as well as the other "ingredients" Ozark Lady mentioned.

I finally found an easy way to make crushed (but not powdered) eggshells. Dry them, put them in a plastic deli container (using pint size right now) and grind/crush with an empty glass sauce bottle. Snap the lid on to store.

[Toil]

Sort of a Lord of The Slugs approach, toil...?



HG

I like lord toil the impaler of slugbania. Mauler of the molusks, salter of snails.



our snails are childs play. Out west I was barefoot once, and stepped in a big pile of poo that squooshed up between my toes. Gross! Even grosser when I saw it was a banana slug about 8 inches long and an inch or more across.

[Kisal]

If I'm not mistaken, those banana slugs have attained protected status in certain areas of Oregon.

[Toil]

Well I do send my minions forth sometimes. Maybe they got greedy.