Slugs back

I ran out of inside space for my tomatoes, so moved them to a Lidl Tent greenhouse a few weeks ago. A few of them got burned by the frost, and not the slugs are back in action - in spite of copious amount of vaseline on pots. The sooner I can get the tomatoes upside down the better. But ti's still a bit cold.

An interesting article here at Irish Gardeners.


Also, we burned some slugs in our wood file, and hope to mix the ash with some rainwater - as a biodynamic deterrent - but I haven't found a recipe, and suspect that I would need to stir for an hour, so not sure if I have the patience for that. Not to mention it's probably the wrong time of the month.

Another solution I saw was to boil garlic and chillies, and spray with the water from that - worth a try - it would sure be wonderful to find something that works.

In the meantime the hooch from my sourdough starter is outside in bowls, and some slugs are meeting a happy end there...

Germination City

Between holidays and work, I'll be away for most of April, so this weekend has been a blitz of planting. I have a lidl 'garden tent' and a cold frame - I'm hoping that the tender plants will do OK in these- can't leave them inside - and that all seeds planted this weekend will germinate, and only some will get eaten by the slugs. I'll either have a glut or an empty garden in May.

 

 

 

 

Dealing with slugs

Since we got frogs, I can't put down slug pellets any more. Returning from our week away, we were ravaged by slugs in our absence, so we have declared war.
We have been baking egg shells in the over, and surrounding seedlings - seems moderatel successful. Also trying broken mussel shells - but we have seen slugs crawling over them. Stapled copper tape on the raised beds - and have seen slugs crawling over that too.

So the best solution has been to go out at dusk, and pick them up, and throw them over the wall to the green area behind the garden. Or else add them to some salted water. The weather nhas improved in tandem with this, but the number we have caught on any given night has reduced sharply since the first few nights, where we were finding more than 100 per night. And the plants seem to be doing better, though dwarf sunflowers seem to be particularly susceptible.

Next year we are resolved to go slug hunting from March on...