Method two: beer
A simple way to control snails is to use beer. Snails are attracted to the aroma of the foamy drink. Therefore, it is necessary to dig several deep holes and place a plastic cup in each of them. Fill more than half full with beer. Having heard the aroma of beer, the snails will crawl into the hole with a glass, but will no longer be able to get out. Every morning, the shellfish caught in the trap should be collected and thrown away as far away from the area as possible. Beer should be topped up periodically to ensure a strong aroma from the pits.
See also: “How to permanently get rid of woodlice on your site.”
Plants that snails love
Snails are big fans of almost all vegetable and fruit plants. They eat not only young succulent leaves, but also flowers, stems and fruits. In addition to garden crops, they also harm ornamental plants. Plants with damaged and sometimes completely destroyed leaves, flowers and stems cannot continue to develop normally, perform photosynthesis and form fruits. Fruits eaten by snails begin to rot and lose their appearance. In addition, they envelop the berries with mucus, which is difficult to wash off even with warm water. Sliding through the plant, the snails leave behind a trail of mucus, which closes the pores and prevents moisture and sunlight from entering the cells, which leads to inhibition of plant development.
Method four: coffee
The aroma of coffee repels shellfish, so you can use this drink to spray plants that can become food for snails. To process crops, you should brew very strong coffee or make it from instant coffee. Then cool and use to spray cabbage, cucumbers, strawberries and other crops that shellfish like so much. In this case, strong coffee should be sprayed not only on the plants, but also on the area around them. Snails do not like the aroma of coffee, so they leave the sprayed area. It is recommended to spray after each rain or watering of the beds.
How to get rid of snails and slugs: 10 ways to fight
You can find them during the day under previously laid out boards, pieces of linoleum, old wet rags, in damp places in the garden. In the warm winter of 2013, I came across snails under old cut stumps, brushwood, and fallen leaves.
There are several chemical methods to combat it, but only birds can be poisoned. For pets and people, this chemistry is not always harmless.
I know several fairly effective ways to fight how to get rid of these garden pests.
1 way. Place a tablespoon or two of cornmeal in the jar and place the jar on its side where you notice the silvery marks. Snails and slugs love cornmeal, but they die when they try it. In the morning you will see many dead shellfish in or around the trap. All that remains is to get rid of them by collecting them and throwing them away from the garden.
Beer trap
Method 2. Dig several holes as deep as a plastic disposable cup. Fill two thirds of the glass with beer and place it in the hole. Snails or slugs, sensing the smell, will definitely crawl. Check these traps daily to get rid of any pests. Top up beer as needed.
3 way. Pour ammonia diluted with water (proportion 1:6) into a container with a spray bottle. Spray the plants you want to protect from these pests with this solution. This concentration of the solution will not burn your plants, but will repel snails or slugs. These pests do not like the smell of ammonia - you will rid the plants of their invasion.
4 way. Prepare strong coffee (brew a double dose). You can prepare a repellent solution from double-strength instant coffee. Cool, strain, charge the sprayer. This solution can be sprayed not only on plants, but also on the soil around them. If you have time, watch in the evening for snails or slugs crawling towards the treated area. They will turn sharply (of course, sharply - this is boldly said, but as quickly as they can because of their slowness) and crawl away.
If you decide to use the third or fourth methods to get rid of snails or slugs, then you will have to repeat these techniques after every rain or after heavy dew.
5 way. Salt destroys and dissolves shellfish. But I would not recommend using salt in your garden beds. Sprinkle salt on paths or paths in your area where signs of pest movement have been observed. Salt corrodes the body of snails or slugs; they will not be able to crawl across the salt path without harm to themselves. Once on the salt, they seem to dissolve. After a while, you will see empty shells, and, as they say, there will be no wet spot left from the slugs.
6 way. To get rid of snails or slugs, fine gravel, crushed shells, eggshells, coarse sand, and coffee grounds are poured between the rows of beds - all this will be an “unpleasant” surface for crawling mollusks. They will not be able to crawl over such an obstacle without injuring their tender tummy.
Scarlet chard will repel snails and slugs
7 way. Slugs do not like plants with red leaves. If you sow, for example, chard beets of the “Scarlet” variety with bright red petioles, leaves with red veins, or amaranth of a variety that has not only bright inflorescences, but also bright crimson leaves, around the perimeter of your plot, then most of the snails or slugs will not reach your plants, will rid you of its presence.
8 way. Place pine needles around pepper seedlings, tomatoes or other plants you want to protect from slugs or snails. You will simultaneously protect them from pests and also mulch the soil, preventing it from drying out. Pine needles create an acidic environment, and mollusks cannot tolerate it, so they will not be able to reach the plants and damage them.
9 way. If you have hedgehogs or frogs, rejoice - this is a great way to get rid of slippery pests - for them slugs or snails are a delicacy!
10th way. Chemical. Gardening stores sell Groza or Meta. This powerful remedy against snails or naked slugs comes in the form of blue, rough granules. I had to resort to this remedy (I used Thunderstorm), since the number of these unpleasant mollusks in the spring exceeds the permissible amount. I have already mentioned that on the first day after planting bell pepper seedlings, 15 out of 40 planted plants were eaten at the roots.
Manufacturers claim that when used correctly, this product is completely harmless to people, pets, and the environment, but I still recommend using it only if the situation is critical.
Blue Groza granules will protect pepper seedlings
And below, see the result of Thunderstorm’s action.
Two days after using the “Thunderstorm” product
Fifth method: salt
You can also get rid of snails in the garden using folk remedies using salt, which dissolves the mollusks. However, you should not sprinkle salt on the beds, as this can harm the plants. Therefore, you should sprinkle salt between the beds and only where traces of snails or damaged plants were noticed.
Salt can also be sprinkled around the perimeter of the area to protect it from snails. Salt dissolves the body of the mollusks, so those that have already entered the site die, and the salt along the perimeter protects the garden from new visitors.
Reasons for appearance in the garden
Gastropods, like other animal species, seek favorable conditions for life. Snails in the garden and vegetable garden are attracted by high humidity, places where they can hide from the scorching sun and food supply. They are not interested in how well-kept the beds are; they also feed on weeds. Abandoned, low-lying land can be infested with these creatures and become a source of infestation for a neighboring garden.
In rainy summers, many snails appear in areas, because such weather promotes their reproduction. And if there is still uncut grass and boards lying around, then there are more than enough places for daytime shelter.
Tenth method: using chemicals
One of the most effective methods of controlling snails is the use of chemicals. The most popular are “Meta” and “Thunderstorm”. These preparations are produced in the form of rough granules, which must be poured in those places where snails or plants damaged by them have been noticed.
These drugs are fast-acting, effective and relatively safe for people, plants and pets. However, it is recommended to use chemicals only if there are a lot of snails on the site and folk remedies have not given the desired result.
If you have snails in your garden, one of ten effective remedies will help you fight them. Some of them are aimed only at preventing the appearance of snails, and some are used to kill them.
Living enemies
In nature, slugs and snails have natural enemies. They can become reliable assistants in pest control. But to do this, you will first have to attract them to the site.
Will help get rid of slugs and snails:
- Starlings. Place several birdhouses on the site. At first, make sure that the feeders contain food for birds that will attract them. Gradually, starlings will begin to independently look for food for themselves.
- Lizards. They actively feed on slugs and snails. To attract them to your garden, place decorative stones that will not only provide decoration, but also provide shelter for the lizards.
- Frogs. There should be at least a small pond on the site. This is a habitat for frogs and a wonderful decoration for the site.
- Ground beetles. These are dangerous, fast and predatory insects. Ground beetles require certain living conditions. They prefer to settle in damp depressions, where they dig comfortable burrows for themselves. Not only adult insects, but also their larvae are very bloodthirsty. They feed on smaller slugs, fly larvae, caterpillars and wireworms. The larvae live in damp mulch and hunt there.
Birds, lizards, frogs and insects settle only in those areas where various chemicals are not actively used.
Repelling snails with mustard
They say that mollusks cannot tolerate mustard and do not even crawl near this plant. Gardeners played on this and decided to try an even more drastic way to scare away snails than planting mustard around the beds. The recipe is very simple - infuse 40-50 g of dry mustard in 250-300 ml of water, and after an hour, spray those plants in the garden that are most often attacked by snails.
The aroma of mustard will scare away snails, which will begin to move to other beds, which means you should immediately take care of their protection. You can also use mustard in terms of prevention, so that pests do not approach young plants at all.
What methods can you use to fight snails in your garden?
By eating a lot of foliage, gnawing out many roots of fruits, and also eating flowers, mollusks cause great damage to the garden - they completely limit photosynthesis, also reduce the occurrence of ovaries, and completely reduce the storage time of an already damaged crop.
An injured plant has the greatest number of attempts to develop various fungal diseases; in addition, the mucus of the pests causes the fruits to completely rot. You can fight all mollusks in the garden in different ways, but it is advisable to use mechanical as well as environmental methods of control.
The chemical method is used only as a last resort, since it is dangerous both for pests and for the plants themselves. The mechanical option for controlling snails is to collect them manually, which is preferably done using tweezers.
We catch snails. You can easily catch snails using traps that are placed in damp places. To do this, old bags, rags, cabbage leaves or burdock, as well as boards are placed between the beds themselves on the paths.
On a hot day, the snail clams will crawl under their shelters; all you have to do is quickly grab them and collect them in the evening. You can also fight mollusks in the country using shallow tanks filled with water and covered with rags. The containers must be dug level with the ground. The collected mollusks are completely liquidated in a saline and soap solution.
Behavioral characteristics and risk factors
Slugs, since they do not have a protective shell, prefer to live in conditions of high humidity. Favorable temperature +15-19 °C. They breathe through the entire surface of their body, so drying out threatens death. However, they are equipped with a defense mechanism - during dry periods, individuals can hibernate, protecting the body with a thick sticky cocoon.
Slugs are active at night, early in the morning and during precipitation; in hot weather they usually hide in the shade (under stones, in lowlands). Mollusks are nocturnal, so it is not always possible to notice the invasion.
Mollusks feed on both plant debris and juicy fruits, vegetables and healthy parts of crops. Favorites include vegetable seedlings, salads and herbs, rapeseed, cucumbers, berries, etc. The complex mouthparts with sharp chitinous teeth resemble a grater in appearance. The pest grinds greens and fruits, leaving small cuts with a smooth edge on the surface.
However, not everything is so bad - slugs and snails also feed on fallen leaves, lichens and fungi, helping to clean the area and process organic matter into a useful form. Shellfish are used as bait for fish and protein food for poultry.
Appearance Features
A slug is a land gastropod without a shell, which is related to the snail. Unlike a slug, a snail has a rudimentary shell.
A slug is easily recognized by its shapeless, elongated body with strong muscles, due to which it takes on different shapes. The color is very different - gray, dirty yellow, light brown, etc. The body size in length is about 3 cm.
Heads with two tentacles carrying organs of vision, touch and smell. The grater-shaped tongue is covered with several rows of small, hard teeth. There is a special mantle with a lung on the back, and a breathing hole on the side.
The slug gets its name from the mucus that covers its body. This is an important component of his life - helping to maintain the microclimate of the body, move and protect himself from enemies.
Slugs are land gastropods
