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Organic Slug Control

Posts: 63

Location: North West PA, USA

posted 14 years ago

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Has anybody used these slug pesticides?

# "Skipper soup": Included weeds, lawn mowings, kitchen waste & plenty of orange peel, mixed 50:50 with water. Was fermented 3 to 8 weeks until bubbled & smelled. Watered generously on ground - not over plants. Immediately killed slugs only, including keel slugs in ground. Applied around potatoes in August.

# Extract of fir tree seeds - strongly diluted.

# "Doc Abrahams No 3 spray": 3oz garlic chopped, soaked 24 hours in 2 teaspoons liquid paraffin. 1 pint (500ml) water & ¾oz liquid soap added. Mixed well& filtered. Stored in a non-metallic container.

# Dead slugs & snails left for a few days in water to ferment.

# Dead slugs & snails ground up & diluted with water - potentised homeopathic spray - sprinkled over garden.

# Extract of ragwort.

# Thin fermented bread dough poured on the ground - kills when eaten.

# Dried couch grass - lightly sprinkled - toxic to slugs.

Source:
http://www.haywardm.supanet.com/pesticides.html

Also I've read that coffee can be sprayed on the plants.

Jeff

Jeff Davis

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Joel Hollingsworth

pollinator

Posts: 2103

Location: Oakland, CA

posted 14 years ago

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No, I haven't. I might have to try some of those soon.

My current strategy is to provide habitat for slender salamanders. I think the garlic preparation might harm them almost as much as the slugs (both breathe through their skin), and I'm skeptical about the dough.

While I don't think the mechanism of homeopathy has to do with the potentization or the choice of starting materials, I think the human attention needed to prepare & properly apply biodynamic preparations is probably the best medicine for most problems...for instance, you have to know where to find slugs during the day, and then you have to walk your fields, and after that it's a while before you would take any other, more disruptive action. I'm trying to work that way.

"the qualities of these bacteria, like the heat of the sun, electricity, or the qualities of metals, are part of the storehouse of knowledge of all men. They are manifestations of the laws of nature, free to all men and reserved exclusively to none." SCOTUS, Funk Bros. Seed Co. v. Kale Inoculant Co.

gary gregory

Posts: 395

Location: northern california, 50 miles inland from Mendocino, zone 7

posted 14 years ago

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I will try some of those, right now I use this product:

So the question is, is Sluggo organic? Well, organic has two meanings. In the sense the chemist understands, the flour part of the material is an organic substance in that it was once a living thing (wheat), and the iron phosphate is an inorganic chemical compound. In the sense meant by the organic farming laws, Sluggo is not approved at this time as a pest management method for use by organic farmers.

I feel strongly that Sluggo will be approved for organic farmers, since its ingredients are not harmful to the environment or to creatures other than snails and slugs. In time, the active ingredient becomes a fertilizer, since plants need iron and phosphorus. For gardeners who have been using metaldehyde bait it is a far better choice, since Sluggo isn't toxic to pets, and is applied so thinly that pets aren't likely to even notice it. I suggest that noncommercial gardeners who consider themselves "organic" go ahead and use Sluggo now, assuming it will be approved.

quoted from: http://goldengategarden.typepad.com/golden_gate_gardener_/2006/05/where_is_the_bl.html

Gary

Posts: 262

Location: Coast Range, Oregon--the New Magic Land

posted 14 years ago

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I have small slugs and bigger snails here. There just isn't much damage at all. The only noticable is a few strawberries, which I wash off and eat anyways. I have lots of birds and garter snakes which eat the slugs. I have plenty of places for slugs to hide out and I do find them.

My grandparents on both sides used to just go out on a sluggy day and pick them up, collect them in a coffee can and throw it in the garbage(one could "rehome" them I guess). This was up in WA with the mutant slugs. That seemed to work pretty well.

Personally I think instead of all the work of spraying or laying out bait, it's better to use a "mechanical" means of control--either making the ground icky for them to slide on with pine needles or copper(coffee grounds will gum them up too), or letting slug predators do the work, or just going around picking them up or leaving things out slugs can hide in.

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Posts: 63

Location: North West PA, USA

posted 14 years ago

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Coffee did nothing. Put a bunch of slugs and snails in a blender then sprayed it on the plants and that did not seem to help either. Amazing amount of them this year but I'm also planting in bales of weeds and on weedy and wet and weedy plots. Sure could convert them into hundreds of duck eggs but with work I'm not around enough to look after animals.

Jeff Davis

Less is more...

Posts: 262

Location: Coast Range, Oregon--the New Magic Land

posted 14 years ago

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they won't cross ash, especially fresh ash(think burning LYE, bwahaha!). Or copper does some weird electrical shock thing to them too. Ever put salt on them?

Personally I think slug bait/pesticide is a waste of time, no matter how organic it is. Addressing it through physical methods works better. Either with texture(ash, pine needles, coffee grounds), collection, predators(snakes, birds)or this one I just figured out---I do indeed have the ganourmous slugs here, I found one when I was clearing off a garden plot next to the woods. I don't have the big ones in my main garden because there is an at least 6 foot wide "no slug's land" strip around it of either shortcut grass or bare dirt--very dry. The big fat slug has to cross that and risk drying out before he gets to the lush garden. The main garden was situated in an open exposed area to beign with, so those big slugs wouldn't have been in that area. THe little slugs can hide under smaller things and yes they're in my main garden, but the snakes and birds help, and they don't do any significant damage anyways.

I'm sure slugs must have photosensitivity(why they like to come out at night). so making an exposed dry no slug's land around your garden would help, I would think. There are lots of snails here too, they stay to the forest also and don't cross that dry exposed border into my main garden.

It will be interesting to see how I do with my new garden that won't have that border.

Joel Hollingsworth

pollinator

Posts: 2103

Location: Oakland, CA

posted 14 years ago

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Slugs don't seem to mind pine needles in my garden bed. Maybe I'm using the wrong variety.

Posts: 262

Location: Coast Range, Oregon--the New Magic Land

posted 14 years ago

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The pine trees I have have more of a sticky needle, not so smooth, they grab at stuff. But a slug moves on it's slime trail, if the pine needles are loosley fluffed, it makes it hard to make a slime trail--probably harder for smaller slugs than bigger ones.

Posts: 3

posted 14 years ago

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I've used decollate (sp? snails and they work. We have three quarters of an acre in zone 10 on the California coast sandwiched between Santa Monica and Pacific Palisades. A Web search will bring up suppliers.

I would not introduce them to areas where they are not already found. They were introduced to the US sometime back in the mid 1880's --l Wikipedia has information on where they are presently found. Once they become established, they manage the garden snail population. The garden snails (weinberg schnecken) were introduced to the grape orchids in California in the hope that they would propagate and be available as a food source. They propagated all right, but evolved to a smaller variety. They are still edible, and a usefull source of protein for the carnivorous. Because of the prevalence and common use of poisonous snail bait, caution should be used in haresting snails in populated areas.

Decollate snails were introduced to manage the pest garden snails in the grape orchids. They are prevalent in California as far north as Fresno. Dunno about the Northwest, though. Our commitment to an examined approach and to do no harm is our guiding principle -- or is it principal ? Never could spell.

Nyna

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posted 14 years ago

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After reading "Sea Energy Agriculture", by Maynard Murray, I decided last fall to try spraying a little sea salt on my small 400 sq ft back yard. I put 1 tablespoon in a gallon of water and sprayed it on the ground as a fertilizer. I did it again this spring. I've had the fewest slugs since I've been at this location in Portland, Oregon and it's been the rainiest spring we've had in a long time. More recently I purchased some "sea solids" from a company (10 lbs for $25, shipped) for use as a foliar spray, adding 1 t / gallon and will use it maybe 5 times during the growing season. I'm kind of thinking of it as replacing the salmon that used to spawn and die in the streams, releasing all of the minerals they brought up from the ocean.

Anonymous

Posts: 0

posted 14 years ago

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I was told to try copper strips to keep them out of my flower boxes but it was expensive @ the garden store.
Will it work? is it worth the money? D

Posts: 40

posted 14 years ago

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I have had copper work in protecting individual plants.

I have a roll of copper foil tape, which is use to shield electronics from interfearance, and I made a few rings out of it and placed it around some plants the slugs were hitting pretty hard. Once I picked off the little baby slugs that had been trapped in the ring, there hasn't been any new holes chewed in it.

I already had the copper tape from work, and the type I have is $50 for 18 yards. I did some poking around Amazon, and they have a 36 yard roll for about $11+S&H. Not sure how this one might hold up outside, but is is cheap enough to give it a try. http://www.amazon.com/JVCC-CFL-5CA-Copper-Conductive-Adhesive/dp/B000UZ8SJK

Posts: 262

Location: Coast Range, Oregon--the New Magic Land

posted 14 years ago

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you could put the tape onto something else(like strips cut from plastic milk jugs) to make it more durable, or so you don't have to fold it over to hide the sticky.

I've heard of people using copper wire, but you need to string multiple strands, I think I've heard a larger continuous surface(like the tape etc) is more effective.

Paul Cereghino

gardener

Posts: 864

Location: South Puget Sound, Salish Sea, Cascadia, North America

posted 14 years ago

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We're attempting Dahlias again this spring -- heretofore impossible due to slugs. When the first shoots show we've been covering them at night with upside down planting pots pressed into the soil. So far no damage--but darn labor intensive. Cascadians will remeber this as the slug spring of 2010. Local meteorologist reported the darkest solstice in 15 years. But sun has emerged today.

Paul Cereghino- Ecosystem Guild
Maritime Temperate Coniferous Rainforest - Mild Wet Winter, Dry Summer

Posts: 32

Location: Ishpeming, Michigan

posted 14 years ago

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I'm not sure what will work but we put every toad we can find inside the garden fence. Toads are supposed to eat slugs.Not sure it's going to help but they won't poison my family in any way. We tried the beer trap thing....that just seemed to attract every slug to the garden

Last year Dad brought me some wood ash from his woodstove to work into the soil, still had so many that they reduced broccoli leaves to the veins.The only thing that seemed to help was going out there, picking them off and putting them in a container of salt.Reduced the numbers anyway.

paul wheaton

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Location: missoula, montana (zone 4)

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posted 14 years ago

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For farms: pigs, chickens and garter snakes.

For small gardens: I have had excellent success with sluggo for organic gardens. It's a fertilizer cased in corn meal (I think) - so the slugs think it is supper yummy but then they die and fertilize the garden. Does not harm birds/snakes/pigs that eat dead slugs.

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Al Loria

Posts: 407

Location: New York

posted 14 years ago

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i've used a similar product called Slug Magic by Bonide, Same basic iron phosphate formula. It is pelletized and works very well.

Larisa Walk

pollinator

Posts: 365

Location: South of Winona, Minnesota

posted 14 years ago

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Our weather was a bit dry this spring and we had just planted and transplanted a bunch of stuff that needed watering. Our only irrigation source is stored rainwater and the tanks were a bit low. So to conserve water we watered in the evening. BIG MISTAKE. The garden became a slug oasis. Everything around the garden was abnormally dry. We had inch-long slugs, tiny slugs, and everything in-between. Slugs started to strip all of the corn, some varieties of beans, potatoes, etc. We researched most of the above methods but didn't want to apply iron phosphide (Sluggo) since the garden is high in both iron and phosphorus. We tried diatomaceous earth until we used up a 5-gallon bucket. Still loads of damage. Then we thought about what we had plenty of: dry wood ashes.

We loaded up the Dustin' Mizer (hand cranked powder blower) and cranked a fine dust of ash on the plants in the evening before dark and in the morning before the sun was up too high. You could watch the slugs squirm, and an hour later they were just a pile of black "snot". Despite 3 times the normal rainfall this month the slugs are now few and far between. We've only used about 5 gallons of ash so the soil mineral balance has not been negatively affected. And the plants have shown no stress either. Good deal! Quick, cheap, and easy enough.

The corn is now almost shoulder high by the fourth of July (a projection of current growth rate), the beans look great and hopefully the potatoes will recover enough to give a good yield of spuds.

Bob Dahse.

Anonymous

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posted 14 years ago

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So the ash has not affected the soil in a negative way, do you think it will eventually be a problem if you keep doing it? or will the ash be neutralized by the sun or something?

Larisa Walk

pollinator

Posts: 365

Location: South of Winona, Minnesota

posted 14 years ago

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I just went out this morning to search for slugs and could no longer find any, so no, I don't think I'll have a problem. Besides, last year's soil tests showed that pH and calcium were getting slightly low, making it a good time to apply either wood ash or high-calcium lime again anyway.

Also, I forgot to mention that I sifted the ashes through a 12-mesh window screen so any cinders of charcoal wouldn't clog the 8-mesh screen in the Dustin' Mizer.

Anonymous

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posted 14 years ago

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Very cool! I will pass your story on to any folks with slug infested gardens that I meet!

Posts: 15

Location: central NYS - USDA Zone 5a

posted 14 years ago

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Northeast Al wrote:
i've used a similar product called Slug Magic by Bonide, Same basic iron phosphate formula. It is pelletized and works very well.

Ditto here. Works great. Nary a slug to be found now.

“Any intelligent fool can make things bigger, more complex, and more violent. It takes a touch of genius – and a lot of courage – to move in the opposite direction.” – E.F. Schumacher

Larisa Walk

pollinator

Posts: 365

Location: South of Winona, Minnesota

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I'll have to partly eat my words on "no ill effects on plants". We saw a fresh batch of small slugs on our celery and celeriac that I hadn't dusted with ash previously. We got rid of the slugs but the next morning the celeriac stems all looked limp, so I lightly irrigated the bed to rinse off the ash. The nest day most of the stems were stiff and upright again, but I don't know if the watering actually made any difference.

So you might want to be careful with "salt-sensitive" plants like carrots, peas, radishes, beans, cukes, and rhubarb. But of all these, most of which I ashed, the only thing that really showed any negative effect was celeriac.

In the long term we're considering a fall "drench" of wormwood tea on the whole 3400 sq. ft. area of garden beds.

Anonymous

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posted 14 years ago

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I know for a fact that the ash has had no bad effects om broccoli, I have used it for a long time with no ill effects.

paul wheaton

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Location: missoula, montana (zone 4)

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posted 14 years ago

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Train your chickens to eat the slugs!

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John Suavecito

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I place mason stepping stones around the garden. I go out at night with a flashlight, pick them up, put them on the mason step, wipe out with my shoe. Come back the next night, they are eating their buddy who died last night, kill him too. Keep on going. Works better in the wetter parts of the year because the dead slug stays juicy and fragrant as food for his buddies better the next night.
John S
PDX OR

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Suzie Browning

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Location: Southwestern Ohio

posted 14 years ago

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I had success putting a nice ring of crushed egg shells around plants. Our spring was unusually wet and with the straw I use to mulch with, they were really bad this year.

Might be a bit time consuming for a very large garden, but if placed there when planting, they might help keep those plants from a setback.

You know the egg shells will be good for the soil and the worms like them too.

On the border of Zones 5 & 6 on the last 2 acres of what was once a large farm. Flat, flat and more flat!

paul wheaton

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Location: missoula, montana (zone 4)

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posted 13 years ago

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Stack rocks/sticks to control slugs:

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T. Joy

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That's pretty cool Paul. Would your chickens go after the snakes or vice versa? Guess you'd have to take care what kind of snake came to settle in your rock piles too. I've got wee ones, they are so careless where they step and what they climb on.

Jordan Lowery

pollinator

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Location: zone 7

posted 13 years ago

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we have those same snakes. in our forest garden i did the terracing with rock, in some spots there are gaps behind from gophers, me and such. there are snakes that live in between the soil and the rocks. i see them in the early morning basking on the rocks to heat up in the spring. sometimes with a few lumps inside them. which always makes me smile.

The ultimate goal of farming is not the growing of crops, but the cultivation and perfection of human beings. - Masanobu Fukuoka

Mekka Pakanohida

Posts: 383

Location: Zone 9 - Coastal Oregon

posted 13 years ago

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pick and kill works best for me the first year. Specially with the larger ones. ICK! Last 2 months I have been working on more areas to attract frogs and salamanders to eat them. I know I have plenty, but more always helps. This year slug populations have dropped by 75% with picking and killing them the 1st year. It's something I keep up on.

Best thing is a stick with a nail attached. Poke, dead, fling.

Mary James

Posts: 145

Location: NW MT Zones 4/5 Rollins Mt

posted 13 years ago

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Ugh slugs, something we found when we moved close to Flathead lake.Never had them anywhere before in Montana..Ick yuck and gross.We have tried so many methods which have included the ever popular hand picking as in 3 gallons a night on a damp evening,,Then there are the chickens whom we have hand picked and fed them too,, however little baby slugs this does not work well.
.Umm the rock pile in the organic slug video,, ummmmm,, we have several hundred tons of rock at our home.We have snakes ,which do a great job with the mice and voles..We even had a nice toad who visited in the evening in our vege garden but he could not even begin to snarf the amounts we had last year..
We have used the beer , the yeast, etc in the tuna cans,, bears like them as well.. so do the neighbors dogs if they can roll in them,,
Umm boards and such they can hang out under ,, yea okay they can be chicken feed this way
The wonders of salt,,, we have turned 30 yr old kids loose with squirt guns and ummm their private guns to do this,,LOL well we also use the grandkids who love to pee on them and watch the end results,,
We have baited with several organics,, Which did work to a point
last year we found as far as some sort of control over the little guys..Ammonia,one to 10 mix with water in a spray bottle ,,helped to handle the beasties..as well as offering a little fertilization to the plants via foliage feeding..
This year we have already began with the organic baits where the gardens are thawing, We did a fall treatment of this as well.This in our gardens, contributed to a reason for not being able to use seed last year.The seedlings were picked off as soon as they sprouted,, not so nice..
Slugs I am sure they serve some purpose in life,, I hope they serve this in someone elses garden next year,, Not ours,,
Hugs,Laughter,Light,Love
M&J

Mekka Pakanohida

Posts: 383

Location: Zone 9 - Coastal Oregon

posted 13 years ago

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puffergas wrote:
Coffee did nothing. Put a bunch of slugs and snails in a blender then sprayed it on the plants and that did not seem to help either. Amazing amount of them this year but I'm also planting in bales of weeds and on weedy and wet and weedy plots. Sure could convert them into hundreds of duck eggs but with work I'm not around enough to look after animals.

I found the best thing to do is to increase frogs on the property.

Failing that, pick / kill the slugs with a nail or razor blade on a stick.

Coffee sprayed on plants "perks" them up, pun not intended.

Rita Vail

Posts: 65

Location: Northwest

posted 13 years ago

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I used to have a lot of slugs. I tried all of these things, but the plants are too big for sprinkling anything around. I don't have slugs much anymore and I think it is because of all the permie things I do. I chop up all my prunings and leave them in piles and that increases the snake population. I collect oak leaves from the neighbors and cover the garden in fall. I don't think slugs like oak leaves. I do sprinkle rock powders, ashes and magnetized dust, but I did that before, too. I no longer use logs to line the garden beds, mostly because the slugs and snails really loved those. I use bark in the paths and it is mostly oak, too. There is not really any bare ground. I pull a piece of greenhouse plastic over the greens bed in the winter and everything survives, even to 17 below zero this year, and that all goes to seed every spring. I do hand pick and throw them into the neighbors yard to get them back for sprinkling moth balls right up next to my fence to kill my (garter)

snakes.

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posted 13 years ago

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we used a combination of setting out shallow bowls and cans with beer/water mix and harvesting first thing in the morning. chickens like beer marinated slugs better than plain! the other thing was to put course sand, wood ash, lime, etc. right around the base of plants which works well if you keep up with it

John Suavecito

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posted 13 years ago

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We live in the Portland OR area and in our specific neighborhood we are prohibited from growing chickens or ducks. I have been going out just before I go to bed to kill the slugs, which love to destroy baby kiwis that are either growing from seeds or cuttings. I pull them off the cuttings or the area. One thing I've noticed this year is that I find very few of them where we have put the fresh wood chips, but we still have a lot (and caterpillars too) on the areas where we have not put fresh wood chips. This is in line with RitaSparrow's findings.
John S
PDX OR

Check out Redhawk's soil series: https://permies.com/wiki/redhawk-soil

Rita Vail

Posts: 65

Location: Northwest

posted 13 years ago

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I've been thinking about this. Perhaps the most important thing I do is allow the weeds to grow up. I eat them all winter and spring (they are growing under the thick plastic that is kept up off of the plants by limbs or the tops from bamboo, because we get ice and snow here in Arkansas) I do know that snails are edible. Maybe someday.

You do have to prune the weeds and even thin them eventually.

At first, when slugs were bad, I kept row covers over the tender plants, and then screening I got from a guy who redoes screen doors. I also think it helped when I stuck pieces of bamboo in the ground (like palisades on the frontier around the forts) to keep the neighborhood pets out.

Sprinkling ashes, diatomaceous earth, sand, soot - made no difference. But then - I had me a regular slug factory with all the chunks of wood and boards lying around. Now there is no wood in contact with soil. I am watching the rocks to see if they are going to be the same problem. Bark is not a problem.

Don't give up. Throw enough mud at the wall and something will stick.

Roger Merry

Posts: 109

posted 13 years ago

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Don't know if its available in the US but I've used nematodes to control slugs - buy it as a powder mix with water and water the beds with it - works really well especially for the little slugs and the slugs that mostly live underground which are the ones that do the damage.

Mostly those big fat slugs eat dead plant material and other slugs so they're good guys

its the little buggers that do the damage and they're much harder to pick and salt. 2 watering cans a year gives slug free potatos

Rita Vail

Posts: 65

Location: Northwest

posted 13 years ago

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I almost forgot - Sluggo works! I used to put it under the dog food bowl. You have to reapply after a rain, so it can get expensive. It dehydrates them, I think.

I love emoticons!
Rita

Mary James

Posts: 145

Location: NW MT Zones 4/5 Rollins Mt

posted 13 years ago

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The copper for those who want to try it on their potted plants.Go to the art store , the stained glass copper comes in different widths and has some heavy duty adhesive on it already to adhere to containers and it is very reasonable in price.It makes for a nice decorative trim as well on the containers,,LOL even plastic buckets.
I am covering a bout 14 thousand sq feet of gardens for slug patrol.Plus they have been known to show up in our greenhouse.Our vege garden is a challenge since it is 148 bales of straw, surrounded by a three to four foot rock drystack rock fence, pathways are pine sawdust..It is also over the drainfield and designed for handicap access so straw bales have been the easiest way to utilize the area.The potatoes were hard hit last year since we use the no dig methods.I will look for the nematodes and give them a try,Since they are not an ammonia fixable one..
The roof garden is the least affected by the slugs it is mostly sedums they do not care for.Nor do they like the herb or mint gardens..The large house gardens along with the pond area has have been challenging but seem to of slowed down slug wise last year,, This we believe is due more to it becoming established before the slugs come out for the spring..All my gardens are mulched with wood bark and chips,, they will even slim across the rough sawn trim around my house windows to slime the glass ,,another perk of having a home buried into a hillside I suppose,,LOL
As I wrote above we have tried basically everything we could find including the recipes that the person starting the thread had, several of those have been used for other types of pests for generations.
I love the diatomaceous earth but it has to be dry to work on any garden pest been there done that,,The seaweed spray is another we are going to try this year a bit more,we are thawing now and have put out the usual organic baits hoping to catch any of the slimers before planting is in full swing.
Has anyone tried sprinkling copper filings around? This is something else we are thinking about trying along the areas that no on walks along barefoot.

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