Those pesky slugs…

We harvested our first crop of salad last week and I have to say that it was incredibly good. However, even after soaking it very well in a deep bowl of water I came close to ingesting a slug on two occasions. I’m thinking that next time I will soak the salad in lightly salted water to see what happens. I think I would prefer to keep the slugs off the plants completely rather than run the risk of eating one, so I went looking for tips in my handy Trade Secrets book.

How to keep the slugs at bay:

:: Open a Slug Pub. I think we all know about sinking a container half filled with beer in the ground.
:: Smear Vaseline around the edge of puts so the slugs can’t climb over and attack the plants
:: Scatter crushed eggshells around young plants so that slugs can’t crawl to them
:: Ash, hawthorn twigs and holly leaves scattered around will stop slugs crawling to your plants
:: After having greased the edge of your pots, don’t place them too close to the wall or the slugs will just climb up and leap in
:: Smear lettuce or cabbage leaves with lard and leave them lying around. When they are covered with slugs, just throw them away
:: Encourage frogs onto your allotment or keep a couple in your greenhouse

I’m not sure if any of these will work but they would be worth a try. Feel free to add any more suggestions.

Written by stephen007 on May 26th, 2006 with 5 comments.
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