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Talkback: Snails
I know how you feel Kate, I too have had a battle with them. Unlike you, I do have some runner beans growing, though I did think at the start I wouldn't have any left. I must admit that I did put a few pellets down at the start but now I am using broken egg shells and it does seem to keep them off my French Beans and my lettuce are doing fine as well.
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Indeed, even here in the Savoie we have had a bumper year for snails and slugs. Unfortunately Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall has proven beyond reasonable doubt that it is not possible to render even the largest slugs edible.
Egg shells, coffee grounds, wood ash. They fart in their general direction, in my experience.
I have used the so-called "bio" pellets. I'm not 100% happy, but if you take into account the cost of bags of compost, plant trays, seed, water, and the man-hours in nuturing the seedlings, then it (almost) compensates for the not completely boi-neutral nature of the product, in my view. Ok, so I sold out. It's my garden and i'll cry if I want to.
I find a sunken trough planter of garden mint keeps them at bay.I plant my lettuces behind the mint and never get any bite marks
They have had a go at my new mint plants & completely ravaged the planters of runner beans & lettuce that were coming on during the very wet spell ( which bit was that?)
I'm proud to say that I still haven't used any slug pellets yet although we have lost a lot of plants. Each night I go out with a torch at about midnight and pick off or trample what I can see! I usually encounter at least 2-3 toads most evenings but some are so fat I think they would struggle to catch a snail! LOL
The thing that winds me up the most is that during my nightly patrol I generally dispose of 4 or 5 in the greenhouse!!... How are so many getting in there I would like to know!!!?....
On a sad note we had a gorgeous Song Thrush resident in the garden who helped us out a bit with the snails but unfortunately I found it dead on the decking with virtually no mark on it at all, caught by that most annoying feline from next door who has notched up several feathered kills in the garden this year already!.... much more annoying than snails!!!
Higgy
http://higgysgardenproject.blogspot.co.uk/
i did wonder why ive had more of a problem then any other year. I also found that they get through my bedding plants in a night. Sorry but ive taken to using the slug pellets. I have to scatter them carefully as i have pets and do not want them poisoned but they totally work. except the clear up of dead bodies is not nice. What i dont like about them is they seem to attract them more. are these slugs etc that are already there or are they coming from afar for the pellets? hmm i dont know.
i mixed them with organic variety which stated on the pack that with these they crawl off and die so no need for carcass clear up so dont know if the organic ones work or not.
I do feel bad. but after all the effort you go through to grow your own.. i really dont want them ruining all my hard work