Buy Your Slug Bait Now. Soon Illegal!

[Wordsworth]

My dad always used beer - he used to help out at his bowling club bar, clearing the pipes etc, and always brought some of the dregs home to use against the slugs! Worked like a charm.

[DreamDisney]

To be fair, slug pellets work by first attracting the slugs and then killing them. When we used them the first year in our current house, we were inundated with slugs and snails! So haven't used them since!

I watch a few gardening channels on youtube (cos I'm so cool), and a video popped up as 'suggested' about how to deal with slugs and snails. DD saw it and insisted on watching it as 'slugs are so cute mummy'... lol

Other solutions:

- small pond, with graduated entry. Attracts frogs, and other animals that are natural predators of slugs and snails. The graduated entry is so that should something like a hedgehog (for example), fall in, they can easily climb out.
- nematodes - by far the most effective solution for this guy
- copper tape. But, and this is a point that I didn't realise, you need to have two lines of the stuff around the pot, and then connect it to a 9 volt battery (that is encased in a waterproof case). He does say though, that the batteries last for about a year each as they expend such tiny amounts of energy.
- Beer traps. Can be made inexpensively out of 2 litre fizzy pop bottles, and cheap beer (it is just the smell of hops that attracts them). Place in either a shaded area, or under arched tile. If it's too hot, it won't have the same impact. Needs to be cleaned regularly. Or you can buy traps.

I'm sure there were other suggestions, but I can't remember them right now. This was the video I think:

We have a veg trug knock off this year, and having them elevated seems to have alleviated the problem massively! On the plants that aren't elevated, I've used a spray bottle filled with water and garlic granules. It stinks, but it does seem to be effective!

[ERICSMUM]

I won’t use the pellets. I just stopped growing anything that slugs and snails like.

[FlorayG]

Metaldahyde pellets actually attract slugs to them anyway - so should be put away from your plants. Hardly anybody does this so attracts slugs TO the plants by putting pellets near them. Also if it rains the slugs will recover.
Ferric Phosphate pellets do not attract slugs but they eat them if they come across them, so these you SHOULD sprinkle around and close to your plants. They don't kill immediately but make the slugs feel ill so they stop eating and go back to their hiding places to die

[ali-s]

Originally Posted by olgaandcoda

Keep chickens, they clean the slugs out like nothing else!

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Mine ignore the slugs and eat my plants, but still solves the problem cos then there's nothing for the slugs to destroy

[florida2010]

We make slug traps using old drinks bottles (see pic) and fill the bottle with beer - costs nothing but a can of cheap beer and it attracts the slugs 🐌 like crazy - they get pickled and its environmentally friendly and no threat to the plants - we call them slug pubs - named each one - slug and lettuce. Pickled slug etc. Remains go on the composter every few weeks. Also good way to reuse wasteful plastic bottles. Worth giving a go. You can buy expensive slug traps but from experience these work really well. Only issue is keeping our dogs off because they love the smell of alcoholic freshly pickled garden slugs. Never felt the need to try one myself

[BarryandCaron]

Using slug pellets to kill slugs... kills hedgehogs 😥

[olgaandcoda]

Originally Posted by ali-s

Mine ignore the slugs and eat my plants, but still solves the problem cos then there's nothing for the slugs to destroy

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That’s so funny! Mine used to love certain plants, but I could spare some! They still seemed to clear any bugs from the garden! I would dig over the soil, let them de bug it and then dig another patch. They must have found weed seeds too, as the beds were the best weed free and slug free. And eggs as a bonus.

[CrochetFreak]

I am glad it is being banned. Too many hedgehogs and blackbirds and other creatures die a painful death after eating slugs that have been poisoned.

Nematoides (sp?) works although there is a time limit on use.

[tocpe321]

Another copper product is a kind of scourer which can be unwrapped, cut to size and wrapped around the bottom and lower part of the plant.

There is a video showing it on YouTube.

google/url?sa=t&sour...UOhL6_f_8 htQp