Garden Thugs...I mean Slugs !!

[Anniekay]

Oh those slimey little grey gooey things that chomp on your poor little baby plants in the dead of night. We as humans have little use for those and they hide like cat burgalers just waiting for darkness to pounce and ruin all your hard work.

Well I have an idea to get rid of them without actually being their final assassin. Slug policeman is what I want to be. Lure them into my trap, ( maniacal laughter) then use the "no knock" technique to surprise them, put them in handcuffs, jail them and sentence them to death row.

How am I planning to do it, you ask? Well, you know how they like to hide in dark, damp places? I'm going to try short pieces of my black garden edging, the kind you edge your borders with to hold the grass from growing in. Why that? Because one morning, after having unrolled and left out all night a long piece the day before, to get the curl out, I turned it over and it was full of slugs !! I had 30+ on one 20' roll.

Now I have many small pirces of this left over so, I figure if I lay that in my garden beds, up under the plant leaves, the slugs will hide there and after sunrise the no knock warrant comes into effect. I then lift the bits of edging, handcuff the culprits, jail them in a shallow box and put them in the shade under my Bamboo where all the birds sleep and play and then the birds can finish them off !!
eat them allllllll up

Only one problem. How to keep them from escaping? I don't think razor wire would work and hiring armed guards would be a bit expensive. Any ideas?

What do you do to keep those critters down?

 

[Meadowlark]

What do you do to keep those critters down?

In over 4 decades of veggie gardening, mostly organic , I have never experienced or even seen a slug. I hear a lot of complaints about them, but honestly just don't have them. Thankfully.

 

[Anniekay]

Oh you lucky dog !! I am completely overrun with them.

 

[Tetters]

We have now resorted to the same sort of evil plan - or Zigs has! We provided the nasty things with lots of hiding places, and Zigs goes down after dark and collects them up to put in the salt bucket before they start their supper on the plants.
There are nowhere near as many as there were a week ago, and now I have been able to stock the freezer with lots of strawberries. We won't use slug pellets, obviously. They just make matters worse, and kill birds as well.
The local farmer has done this in recent years, and there were dead birds all over the place on the crops as the birds had come for the poisoned slugs.

 

[Anniekay]

I won't use the pellets either, but I hate being the one who actually executes the buggers. Makes my widdle feewings hurt.

 

[Mike]

Probably way too hot and dry for slugs where I live, thank goodness. I've seen a few, but it's very rare to see one around here.

 

[Zigs]

You need a hedgehog

Failing that, a bucket of salt water stops them in their tracks.

I moved a big square bit of wood the other day and found several of them under it (in the fruit tunnel). When I moved it again yesterday there was 8 new ones under it, it wasn't the same lot as the day before as they had all gone on vacation to Salt Lake City

 

[Anniekay]

You need a hedgehog

Failing that, a bucket of salt water stops them in their tracks.

I moved a big square bit of wood the other day and found several of them under it (in the fruit tunnel). When I moved it again yesterday there was 8 new ones under it, it wasn't the same lot as the day before as they had all gone on vacation to Salt Lake City

I would Absolutely Love to have hedgehogs !! So cute !! I would build them luxry accommodations and feed them cat food and bowls of sparkling water, if only I had a hedgehog.
I guess I will have to get them all into the paddy wagon and send them to Salt Lake City after all. *sighs*

 

[Sandy Ground]

Lots of slugs in my garden. I think that they are called Spanish Forest Slugs in english. Big horrible things. However, I have devised a way to eliminate them. All thats needed is a case of beer, a comfy garden chair, and a sharpened half moon edging iron. The priciple is easy.

When one is seen, its chopped in half with the edging iron. Then, a beer is opened, and drunk whilst sitting in the chair. As they are cannibals, all its little mates come to eat the corpse. These are dispatched the same way as the first. The whole process is then repeated. More beer, more sitting down. After a while, theres either no more to kill, or you simply dont care! (laughing!)

Of course, some might say this is cruel...

 

[Anniekay]

Lots of slugs in my garden. I think that they are called Spanish Forest Slugs in english. Big horrible things. However, I have devised a way to eliminate them. All thats needed is a case of beer, a comfy garden chair, and a sharpened half moon edging iron. The priciple is easy.

When one is seen, its chopped in half with the edging iron. Then, a beer is opened, and drunk whilst sitting in the chair. As they are cannibals, all its little mates come to eat the corpse. These are dispatched the same way as the first. The whole process is then repeated. More beer, more sitting down. After a while, theres either no more to kill, or you simply dont care! (laughing!)

Of course, some might say this is cruel...

I would love to see that !!

 

[Zigs]

I would Absolutely Love to have hedgehogs !! So cute !! I would build them luxry accommodations and feed them cat food and bowls of sparkling water, if only I had a hedgehog.
I guess I will have to get them all into the paddy wagon and send them to Salt Lake City after all. *sighs*

We have a few of them. I set up the camera to film them last year, caught something slightly bigger after them though

 

[Anniekay]

Wow, a badger !! We don't have any badgers where I live. That was cool !!

I loved when the second hedge hog came up and was so hesitant at first, then knocked the plate over and the first one turned his back and sulked !!

 

[Zigs]

Wow, a badger !! We don't have any badgers where I live. That was cool !!

I loved when the second hedge hog came up and was so hesitant at first, then knocked the plate over and the first one turned his back and sulked !!

I wasn't expecting a badger, they can be right sods. They play football with your onions

I could hear the hedgehogs pushing the bird's food bowl about last night, we had the window open.