Slugs are the bane of every gardener across the country. And given our mild winter and our seemingly continuous damp weather slug number in the garden are greater than ever.
This will have led to much ravaged cabbage in your vegetable garden and miserable looking hostas in your herbaceous borders. But don’t worry, there’s more than just Slug Control Pellets as a control option; the gardener has armed himself with a barrage of organic control options as well.
For those of you of the organic inclination the list of organic slug control options are both long ranging and highly creative. One of my personal favorites would have to be the beer Slug traps, these clever inventions lure the unwanted slug into a trap full of tasty beer (or milk if you want to save your beer) where the slug will eventually drown, but not before having his fill of booze. The result is one less slug chomping away convert Kilogram to Slug on your Cabbages. This slug trap control method is great for many reasons. First, it is organic, no chemicals and no harm to your plants or soil, and secondly, it’s a prevention option, rather than cure where the pest is kept away from your crop and killed before the damage has been caused.
When setting up the slug traps choose an area where slugs are most active, and somewhere close to your cabbage plants. Using a garden hand trowel dig a small hole in which the trap will sit. It is important that the trap is positioned slightly higher than ground level. This is to prevent small ground beetles from falling in and drowning. Another trick is to place a small twig inside the trap to act as a ladder for any ill fated beetles that do end up taking an unexpected bath.
Lastly fill the trap 2/3 full with preferably stale beer. (I hear old Guinness is most popular). Now, the trap is set and it’s just a matter time before the slugs begin to arrive.
At the end of each week empty the contents of your beer traps. You can place the dead slugs on a bird table, or throw in a refuse bin. Refill the beer traps and sit back watch your pest free cabbage grow.
So it all sounds very successful and very easy, if only everything in the world vegetable growing could be that simple. Ok, so these slug traps will probably trap and kill about 5 to 10 slugs in a night (slugs are nocturnal critters) but there is still a lot more slugs in the garden that will need to be controlled. With that in mind, here is a list of ‘Physical barriers’ that can be used to keep slugs away from your plants: Copper bands, coarse hair, egg shells, Sandpaper, Grit, ash, oil (WD40), Cat litter.