One day, in one night, snails ate 15 seedlings of pepper from 40 planted. Let's figure out together how to get rid of snails or slugs in the garden in various ways. You can fight, you can even get rid of them! Snails, slugs are one of the most annoying pests in many gardens. They belong to the mollusk family, similar in structure, biology. Only slugs do not have a shell that the snail has. When moving, these mollusks constantly secrete mucus, which facilitates their movement, and then, when dried, forms a silver trace that signals us about the presence of these pests.
Snail and slug lifestyle
All land mollusks are hermaphrodites, have reproductive organs of both sexes, so they can produce both sperm and egg cells. Therefore, each individual has the potential to reproduce offspring. They can lay eggs up to 6 times a year. The ripening process lasts for about 2 years in snails, and slugs reach maturity after about 3-6 months (depending on species).
In areas with mild winters, such as southern coastal areas, these mollusks can be active all year. When it is cold, they winter shallowly from the surface of the earth. When it is hot, drought, slugs dig deeper, and snails are fenced off from the outside world with a parchment membrane to protect themselves from drying out, they most often attach to tree trunks, fences, or walls. During this period, they live off the stored fat, can remain without food for about three months. This ability is one of many reasons why they have survived for millions of years of evolution.
In humid spring, rainy summer, fall slugs, snails very annoy us, eating strawberries, cabbage leaves, and other garden crops. Strawberries slightly bend to the ground, you look - in the morning half of the berry is bitten, spoiled, and the leaves of cabbage or beets sparkle with large holes eaten by these animals with the help of a horn-shaped jaw-shaped grater. They spoil the seedlings, young shoots of many vegetable crops, the fruits of cucumbers, tomatoes, tubers, potato foliage. They cause significant harm to winter wheat, eating sown grains, young seedlings. Small holes are left on the leaves, fruits of vegetables, and young slugs, hatching in the upper layers of the soil, recesses of various sizes gnaw out on the potato tubers.
Slime (or slug) is the common name for a number of gastropods, which during the evolutionary development have lost their shell. They develop, grow quite quickly, can reach the adult stage in a matter of months, if environmental conditions favor this. Some species produce offspring twice a year - in spring and autumn. Garden sites are usually fond of field, mesh slugs.
Slugs are thick, fat, slippery creatures that have no limbs but have two sets of tentacles in the front of the body. They have no conch, therefore they are called naked mollusks. The absence of a shell allows slugs to live in the soil, spend more time underground, there they also find food for themselves: potatoes, carrots, beets, and we lose part of the crop.
Slimes in storages pollute vegetables, leaving traces of frozen mucus, earth, and residues of feces, which contributes to decay of the crop, reducing its shelf life. And crawling on different plants, snails, slugs spread various diseases.
With the onset of autumn coolness, slugs penetrate into the country house, leaving behind them long silver stripes - dried mucus. Admit it: it is unpleasant when you accidentally step with your bare foot on a wet, cold, slippery slug or suddenly hear an unpleasant crunch of an accidentally crushed snail.
The snail’s long, moist, soft, slippery body is protected by a hard shell, where it hides when you disturb it. Its typical shell has a conical shape, twisted in a spiral. They, just as slugs belong to the class of invertebrates (animals that do not have a spine), can live under any conditions - in the sea, fresh water, on land in humid conditions. Both have two pairs of tentacles on their heads with the organs of smell and touch. One pair of tentacles longer than the other, looks like horns. These "horns" are eyes that are located on the tips of a long pair of tentacles. A short pair of tentacles is used to smell. Tentacles are very important to them. They have no ears, but their amazing sense of smell helps them find food.
These mollusks are less active during the cold or, conversely, hot, dry months. On wet days, they can be found most often under cabbage leaves, under boards, stones. There they hide during the day, and in the evening go out for food. In wet years, they can cause significant harm to garden plants. They feed on leaves, stems, flowers, fruits that are close to the ground, such as strawberries, tomatoes, cucumbers. They feed mainly at night, although sometimes they act during the day when it is cloudy or raining. During heat, dry weather, they may be temporarily inactive.
How to get rid of snails and slugs: 10 ways to fight
You can find them during the day under pre-laid boards, pieces of linoleum, old wet rags, in wet places in the garden. In the warm winter of 2013, snails came across to me under old sawn stumps, brushwood, fallen leaves.
There are several chemical methods to deal with it, but only birds can be poisoned. For pets, people, this chemistry is not always harmless.
I know some quite effective ways to control how to get rid of these garden pests.
1 way. Put a tablespoon or two of cornmeal in a jar, and put the jar sideways where you noticed silver marks. Snails, slugs like corn flour, but when they try it they die. In the morning you will see many dead mollusks inside or near the trap. It remains only to get rid of them, collecting, throwing them away from the garden.
2 way. Dig a few holes, for example, with a plastic disposable cup. Fill two-thirds of the glass with beer, put in a hole. Snails or slugs, smelling, will certainly crawl. Check these traps daily, get rid of trapped pests. Add beer as needed.
3 way. Pour ammonia diluted in water into a container with a spray (1: 6 ratio). With this solution, spray plants that you want to protect from these pests. This concentration of the solution will not burn your plants, but it will scare away snails or slugs. The smell of ammonia does not like these pests - you will save the plants from their invasion.
4 way. Make strong coffee (brew a double dose). You can prepare a deterrent solution from instant coffee of double concentration. Cool, strain, charge sprayer. This solution can be sprayed not only plants, but also the soil around them. If you have time, then watch in the evening for snails or slugs crawling to the treated area. They will sharply (of course, sharply - it is boldly said, but as quickly as they can because of their slowness) they will turn around, crawl away.
If you decide to use the third, fourth methods to get rid of snails or slugs, then you will have to repeat these methods after every rain or after heavy dew.
5 way. Salt destroys, dissolves mollusks. But I would not recommend using salt on the beds. Sprinkle salt on the paths or paths of your site where traces of pest movement are seen. Salt corrodes the body of snails or slugs, they can not crawl through the salt path without harming themselves. Once on salt, they seem to dissolve. After a while you will see empty shells, and from the slugs, as they say, there will be no wet place.
6 way. To get rid of snails or slugs, small gravel, crushed shells, eggshells, coarse sand, and sleeping 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 a barrier without hurting their delicate tummy.
7 way. Slugs do not like plants with red leaves. If you sow along the perimeter of your plot, for example, beetroot chard of the variety “Scarlet” with bright red stalks, leaves with red veins or an amaranth of such a variety that has not only bright inflorescences, but also bright raspberry leaves, then most snails or slugs will not get to your plants, save you from your presence.
8 way. Sprinkle around seedlings of pepper, tomatoes or other plants that you want to protect from slugs or snails, pine needles. You simultaneously protect them from pests, and also mulch the soil, protecting it from drying out. Pine needles create an acidic environment, and mollusks cannot tolerate it, so they will not be able to get to plants, damage them.
9 way. If you have hedgehogs, frogs, rejoice - this is a great way to get rid of slippery pests - for them slugs or snails are a treat!
10 way. Chemical. Gardener shops sell Thunderstorm or Meta. This powerful remedy against snails or naked slugs is a rough blue granules. I had to resort to this remedy (I used Thunderstorm), since the number of these unpleasant mollusks in spring exceeds the permissible amount. I already mentioned that on the first day after transplanting Bulgarian pepper seedlings, 15 of the 40 plants planted were eaten at the root.
Manufacturers claim that, if used correctly, this tool is completely harmless to people, pets, and the environment, but still I recommend resorting to it only if the situation is critical.
And below see the result of the Thunderstorm.
Potato snails - what to do
Last year it was hot, so the potato was tight - there was not enough moisture. The numerous reviews of gardeners from the Internet about the benefits of siderats convinced me. About how wonderful it is to use them as mulch, which will keep the soil moist in hot, dry weather.
I specifically allocated areas for siderata. One was sown with mustard, the other with fatselia. Sowed early as soon as the snow came down. Just in time for the hilling of the potatoes, they mowed them. She covered two rows of potatoes with slightly dried grass. It seems to have sown a lot - more than a hundred were occupied by siderats. But it was enough to cover only two rows with mulch (20 holes in each row).
I decided to see where the crop will be better - with mulch or not. And then it rains, rains, rains ... Without any mulch, the earth is wet.
But the biggest trouble was revealed recently. On these potato bushes, which are covered with dry grass, are a mass of snails - small, white. Delayed until dusk, without really looking at it, I did not immediately realize what happened to the potatoes - I thought the white flowers appeared by night - there were so many of them.
During the day they were not there, and in the evening they crawled out of this dry grass, where, apparently, they were hiding from the sun, they began to supper with the leaves of my potato. And on the uncovered mulch potatoes they were almost gone. Here is such an experiment.
But the tops of potatoes under dry grass are higher, more powerful. I looked more closely - the lower leaves of the potato became openwork! How not to lose the harvest!
Maybe they won’t eat all the tops? ... We need to urgently do something. I was not ready to deal with such a small fry, with so many pests.
Be sure to share how I dealt with this problem.
P.S. I’m sharing ... In 2015, the weather coped with this problem. It was wild heat all summer, including the first half of September. In the summer, there were practically no snails on potatoes and other plants. They were hiding in the ground or somewhere else.
Another addition ... It turns out that when planning measures to combat snails, you should pay attention to the phases of the moon. The best time to fight snails is the growing moon in Scorpio.
The article was updated on February 12, 2020.