How funny I’ve just typed my next post on slug damage on the dahlias and on copper bands as protection-I’d better post it. In this walled garden it’s not possible to grow herbaceous plants without those blue slug pellets. I scatter them in a tall metal container and then I hunt out slugs and snails hiding under foliage and drop them in on top of the pellets. It makes for a disgusting time emptying the container but does mean plants are saved from total destruction. If I’m out there doing major gardening and if I’m wearing wellington boots I gently crush snails underfoot on the path for the birds to take for supper.

Looking forward to seeing your update whether spent cofee ground have been effective or not, and to what degree. We used to get them for free at Starbucks but they seemed to have stopped giving them away.

Viliganced, slug pellets and hope is my method. But doesn’t always work, partly because I cannot always be viligant. I’m blaming the Tory govt for the slugs.

Well…..my fellow friend and Canadian Linda, beat me to the punch!
We used to scatter broken egg shells and put tiny containers of beer, just under the surface of the soil…it worked!
Slugs hold their alcohol like…well….not well! Hahaha!
They drink the beer…get drunk…and drown…keep the container just above the soil level, so the Beetles,which eat slugs….don’t fall in!
Best of luck Jessica!
Cheers!
Linda:o)

ps….gonna fill in my info again!

I heard the ‘beer slug solution’, too…..a pan will attract them like crazy (or so I’ve been told). Not sure if they drowned or drink. Inquiring minds want to know should you try this.

We have some enormous slugs here too. I just use slug pellets, like Sluggo Plus. And occasional hand-picking when I see them. I don’t fling though, I usually either toss them into our yard waste bin, or kill them outright with a skewer.

Chickens! Not because they eat slugs – even hens seem to reject these as a food source (well, ours do but then perhaps they are particularly fussy) – but because you can re-use the crunched up egg shells as a shardy barrier. As an added measure I’d paint the shells grey, doesn’t matter what shade. Well, it’d keep me back if I was a slug!

Sounds like you need some ducks to me! They will go mad for the slugs and shouldn’t go near the plants too much. We’ve got some and they are fab.

I absolutely will not use slug pellets because of the potential for putting poison into the wildlife food chain. There’s also far too great a risk of putting poison into the Daisy food-chain as well 🙁

I’m probably asking for it by saying this out loud but we are remarkably untroubled by slugs and snails. Don’t get me wrong, of course we have them, but the damage is bearable. I’ve currently got some wonderful hostas in the Coppice (note to self, must take pictures) which are mostly uneaten. I put this down to three ponds, the addition of an abundance of frogspawn over the years resulting in at least 20 or 30 frogs seen mating this year, and loads and loads of birds. Hence the refusal to use poison.

Or you could have non-Rusty Ducks. Which will be fabulous, especially Indian Runners who (allegedly) don’t eat your plants. But they do poo . . . everywhere :-{

I used to get the coffee grounds from the cafe at the local garden centre, but that supply has dried up unfortunately (friend no longer works there, daughter who used to work there away at university) but it does work and I use my meagre supply of home produced coffee grounds around favourite plants. I don’t use slug pellets at home but I do stamp and squish without guilt and I’m vigilant about checking under pots. I have an ancient container of slug pellets at the allotment that I use very sparingly for newly transplanted plants only where the survival rate can be pretty bad. But frankly slugs and snails at the allotment are the least of my problems …

I wish I had advice. Slugs are a problem here too and I haven’t found anything that works very well yet. I hope you do!

When we lived in Cambridgeshire, I used to through slugs over the fence into the neighbour’s (completely neglected) garden, in the hope there would be so much for them to eat there, they would leave my cultivated plants alone! We have bark chips round the hostas, which works. I have read that sprinkling salt on them kills them, as does the beer trap, and I seem to recall someone telling me that a spot of bleach does the trick?
Perhaps you should invest in some ducks and/or chickens!!

I’m afraid we use blue pellets, having tried everything else under the sun including egg shells, oats, coffee, copper and beer etc etc etc etc…. I try and pick up any dead slugs before the wildlife has a chance to eat them. I don’t like using them as you can imagine but the plants were all being eaten :o( So far, we have few slugs here (yet). Hope it works for you :o)

Thanks for the tip re: the coffee, always plenty of that around here. Sadly I cannot offer any advice in return Jessica.

I’m laughing about the flying slugs. I lob snails over the back fence. One day I’ll no doubt hit someone in the lane. I’m sure they come back anyway. I’m sure I heard that if you paint them with nail varnish and take them miles away they still turn up again. The hostas here are in ribbons. In fact one is just a stump. I’ve tried copper tape around the raised beds. Of course it does mean that any slugs hiding in the raised beds are then trapped there and unable to leave… I have a small pond now, and the frog population has certainly increased. I’ll let you know if I find the answer.

Hi Jessica, I use organic slug pellets and also experimenting comparing grit with the sheep wool product. The problem with the barrier methods as soon as plants over lap each other they travel above ground! I am trying a garlic wash for a second year, (With mixed results) I was given it by a Hosta national collection holder. The mixed results may be due to having to remember to do it every 2 weeks.
The recipe is: Crush 2 garlic bulbs, add to 2 pints of water and boil for 3 minutes.Cool and strain, make back up to 2 pints.Use 1 tablespoon per gallon of water in a watering can with a rose. pour over leaves in LATE AFTERNOON. Do this every 14 days.
It certainly smells of garlic!

I’m glad the coffee seems to be working…it does for me as well (I have 2 cups each day so enough for favourite plants). I’ve never seen anyone trial the copper rings and they are pricey – so it’s interesting to see that they don’t really work. The only other tip I have is to put salt on a slug – it causes them to desiccate and die (almost immediately) but I prefer the deterrents rather than the killing….

The worst of it is that they lay their eggs underground and in the past I have even found potatoes tunnelled through by slugs. We use coffee grounds and sometimes beer traps, but usually they are hurtled into the field behind us. Encouraging as many frogs and toads as possible too.

Yes, this is an issue for me, too. Especially during a moist spring like we’re having now. I usually put out shallow tubs of beer–which attracts them and then they drown. I don’t want to use diatomaceous earth or other rough treatments for fear of harming caterpillars–especially Monarchs. I’ve recently added sand around some plants. But I didn’t know about coffee grounds. I will try that. Thanks!

well as I have said many times over the years on my blog and else where I use sand a lot! it scratches their skin and they don’t like it, I imagine the coffee granules are doing the same, the plant that has been eaten despite being in copper and wool, could it be something else, since earwigs arrived in my garden curtsey of a Beth Chatto ligularia earwigs have become a big problem for me, good luck with whatever you try, Frances

Unfortunately Sluggo seems to be attractive to something other than slugs (I suspect mice) as they disappear without trace as fast as I replace them under the broken clay pots that I use to coceal them. An expensive way to cultivate a race of super strong mice from these iron based pellets!…..and the slugs are still munching my plants.

Slugs hoovered up our carrot seedlings! Poodle wool has some effect but when my sisters poodle visits and smells her ex-wool she isn’t happy and it is a bit intrusive. This year we are spraying host as with a repellent – time will tell whether this will work.
Forget welly wanging let’s have a mollusc wanging competition.

Beer traps always worked here but we stopped using them the day the dog drank the contents and got high on beer and fermented slugs!

Hmmm…… Have you tried diatomaceous earth? It works for a lot of pests like ants and snails?
Interesting about the coffee. I wonder if deer and rabbits would dislike that too?

We do tend to use the beer here, but with you saying coffee, I remember being in Starbucks last year and they were giving away used coffee grounds by the bagful for the garden. I will go along and take some this year to see how this goes. Good luck xx

I do hope the ground coffee works! I have thousands of snails too……we need more frogs!xxx

Slugs – the eternal problem. Slug pellets are my friend. Hope the coffee grounds work.

Sorry for being so tardy Jessica, I’m struggling to catch up with all things blogging. Quite a while ago – probably March/April time I was removing some invasive shrubs that were close to a fence. Tucked inbetween the shrubs and the fence was a huge colony of snails, large, small, adult and babies. I collected the lot and put them in the weelie bin, where they climbed to the top but they couldn’t get out. I would like to think that I was in the right place at the right time and eliminated an entire dynasty! but since then I haven’t seen many lurking around. I will try the coffee test though, I don’t have a percolator but I do use coffee pods.