slug pellets - Page 2

To make sure snails don't return, 90 feet (say 30 metres) is a minimum. To be sure, it should be 100 metres (300 ft). I will paste in here the research that showed this, and if it prints as coded rubbish, just take my word for it:

<Now, Radio 4 is launching its search for the next BBC Amateur Scientist of the year.

Last year, 70-year-old gardener Ruth Brooks won the award for her research into the homing distance of garden snails.

She found that Helix aspersa, the common garden snail, can find its way home from up to 30m away. But for gardeners to be sure that their snails will not come back, they should be moved over 100m.>

oh my i have a slug problem and half, loads of 20mm white slugs ALL OVER MY GREENHOUSE!!! my fault i had a new baby and neglected the greenhouse for a week and then went to check and they eaten loads of my marigolds my chillies etc but anyway got in ther spent around 2hours in greenhouse search and destroy mission lol, found litterally 100+ of these lil buggers!!! so i "exterminated" them, checked daily for a week removing maybe 20 a day there after now the whole place is coverd in slug pellets (its a sealed greenhouse no birds etc can get in) so hopefully on top of the prob, check my you tube "Gummer4england" on my progress with the slugs and my crops

Just a thought: do slugs and snails feel pain? I know I'm two-faced - I use blue slug pellets regularly. But the "pain issue" does bother me......I certainly couldn 't cut them up with scissors and I couldn't crush a snail with my foot.

if you have issues "removing" them just think of the situation like this for the pain, of them like a dog been given the "sleep" injection and go to sleep all naturally and pain free (obviously this is fictional and not fact based and only a way to help you deal with your problem)

hope it helps :/ 

Think I'll stick to pellets, egg shells, gravel and a few other lazy gardening idea's to keep the slug/sanil population down  rather than trying to launch them into orbit in the hope they'll land 300ft away

Garlic Wash. Works wonderfully!

I'd have thought being cut in two, or quickly despatched with a big boot would be less painful than being poisoned by pellets.  Not sure whether there's any research on how long it takes a slug to die after ingesting pellets.  Anybody know?
Happily I have frogs, newts, hedgehogs, birds and beetles that take care of any visiting slugs and snails......one very canny frog has taken up residence under a large hosta....happy frog, healthy hosta

I'm pretty sure slugs and snails don't feel pain. They don't have a central nervous system, and I think probably all they experience is existing or not exisiting (if that). If I find live snails I stamp on them, which means it's all over in a spit second. Slugs I either drown in salt water or throw into the compost heap or the "brown bin", or take away from the garden altogether.

I do put pellets down near susceptible plants (especially this Spring, as all this dampness encourages them) but I also try to patrol the area and remove dead slugs and snails regularly, just in case a bird decided to eat them.

We do have plenty of "wild" areas in our garden where the birds will still find lots to eat, so I don't think I'm depriving them of a significant food source. There are very few hedgehogs in our area, but I think this has more to do with a heavy badger presence than with the use of slug pellets. That, however, is another issue...

On the danger to hedgehogs-it does say that they have to eat around 5000 poisoned slugs to have any effect

http://www.wildlife-web.org.uk/hedgehog/facts/dangers.html

Somewhere on a message board I read that you should start the pellet treatment from mid-February - use Valentine's Day 14 February as a reminder and scatter the pellets every 10 days to two weeks from then onwards.  I did it and it seems to have worked - I've had very few slugs and snails this year.  I think starting so early catches them before they start breeding.

I would definitely recommend this method.  I can't kill them directly - just looking at them makes my stomach heave!

I have just come in from a quick potter in the garden and got so cross I have just collected a bucket load of snails and put them in a bucket of water and drowned them!!! 

all 4 cucumber plants have had thier stems chewed through, all my runner beans have gone and I have lot countless sunflowers. My hollyhocks and hosta are shreaded and all my cosmo seedlings have just vanished!!! 

When its this wet, its so hard to keep them at bay, pellets what ever type dont last long, beer just dilutes, gravel - I have never had that much success, coffee grounds etc wash away.

I couldn't bring my self to use scissors and the noise of the shell under foot goes right through me. 

funny as I have no issue with stamping on vine weevil grubs and lily beetlesmaybe its the added squish factor  

I do start early in the year with the pellets - but I think this year we are fighting a loosing battle

please forgive me if iv done this one before as im finding replying difficult on my new pc anyway,for slugs in the midlands we used to get the slops from our local pub and place jam jars or cut down plastic bottles in the ground ,the beer is poured into the jars and the slugs climb in and die very happy ,might not get them all but see how the jars fill up cheers

As sparklepinksunflower said - it's the squish factor!  Having to empty the drowned corpses would just finish me off - I haven't got a weak stomach and I don't mind snails so much but slugs..........uuurrrggggghhhh..........my stomach is heaving even thinking about it!

I'd love to have hedgehogs and frogs to sort out the problem for me, but I'm afraid they're not things I can just buy in Tesco.............

I'm going to give up on  launching snails now, I had no idea they had a homing instinct!! I'll put them in the wheelie bin with "a try finding your way back now!!!"

I have absolutely no problem with the sound of snails crunching underfoot.  It is one of my favourite sounds.

as 4711 says beer slops work ,but some pubs wont give them to you on health and safity grounds so I buy very cheep beer in aldi or lidl

i was told about a lard and salt rub for your pots.. not tried it yet and a salt water spray.. mix up with warm water and spray them.. not trie dit yet.. but will be this week.. wil let you know.

Ive got the little blitters too munching away on my runner beans..... i use blue slug pellits but a friend told me last night to use vaserline..so last night i rubbed some on my canes.. lets see the buggers get up those...

what is Garlic wash...... can you make it yourself.

Garlic wash

https://www.bowdenhostas.com/pages/Garlic-Wash-Recipe.html

Thanks Sotongeoff I shall give that a whirl....so easy too