" If dere's wan ting worse than the black and tans, " tis slugs ! There's something about those slimy horrid little creatures that brings out the serial killer in me. A proud gardener can spend weeks nurturing their seedlings along, even abandoning ones own children to lovingly coax to life a future crop of tender lettuce. Only to have it wiped out in one nocturnal orgy of destruction by our foe the snail. Somehow this seems to gall us more than having a full plate of lettuce rejected amid upturned noses and pushed away plates, why is this ?
So I've been collecting egg shells with quite a while, the quizzical wonderment of my long suffering wife will hopefully be rewarded with a plate of lettuce or maybe a parsnip or two. You see the crushed egg shells if applied around the young seedlings will go some way towards discouraging the hordes of snails looking for easy pickings, by lacerating their soft squishy bellies. Yes, lacerating, a fine word when applied to a slug. So I look forward to following the trail of slime and at the end of it instead of finding a missing row of seedlings, I hope to find a writhing, twisted, but still alive slug. There will be an interrogation, something Jack Bauer would be proud of ! And if he gives up his friends, I'll see to it he gets a fair trial and a quick death.
Anyway, egg shells, crushed, around plants, slug deterrent. That's all I meant to say !
I've been hand-picking ~200 slugs per night in my garden at the expense of the care of my husband. Time consuming and not very rewarding, as each night has found just as many all over again! I gained access to a large volume of eggshells from a local pasta company which saves them for me. I take them home and crush them, using a system I rigged. Then, I place them around my beds. This didn't seem to reduce the populations because I have so many. Sooooo, now I've thought of a couple more ideas I want to get off my chest and share with someone who might be able to offer me some input, feedback, or 2 cents.
ReplyDelete1) Egg shell mulch over the whole bed? Keeps slugs down, and water in. I live in an area where mulching is somewhat discouraged in principle as it provides slugs a habitat. However, the problem could be that such a large volume of eggshells might over alkalinize my garden soil. ?! Potential arguments for this are that our soil in general is thought to be slightly acidic anyway and ALSO that eggshells are so slow to break down... The answers I would like to come up with are whether that many egg shells would be ill-advised and whether they would be an effective mulch to discourage slug activity AND hold in water. HUM. Thanks for listening.
Picking slugs is never an enjoyable job, unless of course you're a bird or a hedgehog. Have you tried slug traps ? I used these and they have proved quite effective. Not sure about the blanket mulching of eggshells though and soil ph.
ReplyDeletei know this is a year latter, but i'm researching the 200 egg shells a day i'm going to be getting. for slugs and snails, ducks!!! i love to watch my ducks suck up the slugs, slug slime dripping from their bills. the snails they swallow whole.
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