controlling slug problems in the garden, organically

[paul wheaton]

[Pat Farrell]

When I was growing a lot of strawberrys, the slugs were a serious problem. My solution was to put out aluminum pie pans with a 1/4" of draft beer in them. The slugs loved the beer, but it killed them.

[Randall Twede]

geese are a well known way to go...they seem to love slugs. beer is also a good one. so is salt

ok...the video says ducks...i say geese

[Campbell Ritchie]

I thought you used chickens before?

[Janeice DelVecchio]

I have a very small patio with a few rose plants in pots. No place for geese, ducks, or chickens.

I have used the dishes with beer. I find the darker beers that have a sweeter/malty taste (as opposed to the more bitter/hoppier) attract the slugs better than domestic american crap. I think the slugs must have good taste. The important part is keeping the beer warm and only slightly stale. Too stale and they don't like it. Also the more pungent the better.

I have also tried the manual scraping the slimy guys off the plants. This is more time consuming, but more effective. I had a serious issue and not enough slugs were coming to drink at the local beer joint and I had to manually kill a bunch.

This year, I plan to get some pliable copper tubing and make a barrier around my pots. Slugs won't cross the copper because it's toxic to them or something.

[Saurabh Pillai]

Can someone please mention what problems does slug create?

[Pat Farrell]

For me, they ate all my strawberries exactly the second that they were ripe. I only could gather twice a day, before and after work. The slugs could wait all day and all night, and chomp at the perfect time.

If they left my strawberries alone, we'd all live in peace and happyness. But when they ate all my strawberries, every day, after all the work I put into the patch, planting, fertilizing, weeding, watering, etc. this means war.

[Sachin Patil]

Slugs are my number one enemy. I tried all sorts of things except duck or geese. I kill at least 10 a day. I tried salt but the wrong way, I spread salt on plants and they died. I want to try beer but not sure my puppy would leave it for slugs.

[Pat Farrell]

Sachin Patil wrote: I want to try beer but not sure my puppy would leave it for slugs.

All of the dog's I've lived with loved beer. I don't think its good for them.

I had a 15 1/2 gallon keg in a dedicated refrigerator, so we always had plenty of beer and could spare some on the slugs. We kept the dogs inside most of the time.

[Sachin Patil]

Pat Farrell wrote:

Sachin Patil wrote: I want to try beer but not sure my puppy would leave it for slugs.

All of the dog's I've lived with loved beer. I don't think its good for them.

Thanks. I thought so.
I also tried those pellets from warehouse, don't work. If I try duck would it get along with dog?

[Randall Twede]

salt

[Randall Twede]

the dog will eat the duck turds...im sorry you left it open

[Sachin Patil]

Randall Twede wrote:the dog will eat the duck turds...im sorry you left it open

Is that good or bad for dog?

[paul wheaton]

More of my videos about slugs: