how to kill slugs/snails?

Question

I live in San Diego, and have a tiny garden which I love extended from our condo, but it's also surrounded by Ivy, which I guess these annyoing little creatures love and they are eating my garden up. I just read that putting pennies as a barrier around my garden will help and also read to spray part water and vinegar mixture, but it didnt' say if it was safe or not to spray on my plants. Will vinegar ruin my plants? I want to find a safe, natural way to do this. My cats go on our patio and I dont want to get them sick.

Answer 1

Here's some easy environmentally friendly pesticides you can make yourself. You'll be successful in repelling the slugs & snails if you use more than one of these methods at the same time, such as a slug/snail repelling mulch, plus a wood &/or sour milk trap. I hope the following info helps in deciding which method or combinations to use. Good luck!

1. Strong coffee! "A study in the journal Nature found that slugs and snails are killed when sprayed with a caffeine solution, and that spraying plants with this solution may prevent the slimy mollusks from eating them... The researchers found that large doses of caffeine slowed the snails' heart rates and made contractions irregular." (1) Another study found that "After 96 hours, all of the snails treated with a 0.5% or 2% caffeine solution were dead." (2)

2.Chile Pepper. Capsaicin, the natural "heat" of the chile pepper, makes snails unwilling to cross materials containing the naturally repelling properties of chile pepper." (3)

3. Galic spray: Blend well 1garlic bulb & 1 onion add 1Tbsp cayenne pepper & 1 quart water. Steep ingredients for 1 hr, then strain & add 1 Tbsp dish soap and your non-toxic spray is ready to use. (4)

4.Repellent mulches: Wormwood, prostrate rosemary, basil, rue, acacia bark, and oak leaves are disliked by snails and make good repellent mulches. Wormwood is also effective as a spray.

5. Barriers: Dry, dusty or sharp material can be a barrier to snails, such as hydrated lime, wood ash, sharp sand, crushed egg shells, or diatamaceous earth. "A band 20cms wide and 1 cm high is required. The effectiveness of barriers is reduced when wet so locate them away from watering points. Snail fences may also be made from galvanised metal, window screen wire and similar materials. 30 mesh copper screens can ... prevent climbing, or steel wool can be wound around trestle legs in glass houses." (5)

6.Traps: Place board on ground & scrape off snails when they gather on the underside, &/or place shallow containers sunk into the ground and filled with beer or other fermenting substances such as sour milk, or even "a mixture of water and bakers yeast." (5) Combining both methods by covering part of the container with a board should prevent your cats & other creatures from drinking it .

Onion & Marigold plants repell slugs & snails, too.

Be careful with vinegar on your plants, because it might kill them if the mix per water is too strong. Did you know that when used full strength it is an herbicide? However, diluted 1 ounce per gallon of water, it lowers the pH of alkaline tap water, which some feel is a good thing. (6)

Answer 2

Salt will eventually damage your plants. How quickly depends on how much and how often you pour it on the slugs.

Beer is the accepted method of dealing with these pests...however there are a couple of other ways. One being yeast diluted in water, as it is the yeast in the beer that draws them...or snail and slug bait - which you can buy most anywhere, including Wal-mart or Lowe's.

if you decide to use beer (my personal choice, as it is simple and easy to use) put it in a small container with a lid that has had a three or four holes cut around the edge. yogurt container or something similar is perfect. Dig a small hole and put the container in it, pour in the beer, and snap the lid on. That way the cats aren't getting drunk, while the slugs thrive. :)

One other thing you might want to do is place a short piece of board in the garden (hide it under hosta leaves) and put the beer baited container close to it. The slugs like to hide during the day time and the board provides the perfect place...plus you can lift it and smash the little slimmers, thereby reducing the slug population even quicker.

Egg shells are helpful, but not 100% effective and can look messy. Copper will shock and kill slugs - hence the idea of pennies providing a barrier. Copper wire is an accepted method, but it can be a danger to your cats, so I wouldn't recommend it.

Hope this helps.

Answer 3

Snail poisons are extremely toxic to both humans and pets. There isn't a safe, overnight solution to rid your garden of snails and slugs.

Putting down barriers that slugs can't cross is, perhaps, the best way to protect your garden from these common pests. Keep them from entering and you won't have to use pesticides.

Step One:
Water your garden only in the early morning, or use an underground irrigation pipe. This will keep the top of the soil dry and uninviting to slugs and snails.

Step Two: Spread dry soot, dry ashes, dry lime, sharp cinders and dry chalk around plants or beds. Any one of these or several in combination should do the trick.

Step Three: Rough, sharp sand is another option. Use it the same way as the materials in Step 2.

Step Four: Try calcified seaweed or crushed eggshells as a barrier.

Step Five:Another barrier material is clippings from thorny roses or holly leaves. Rosa rugosa (Japanese rose) clippings are good.

Step Six: Spread pine needles in your garden (these are also good mulch for strawberries).

Step Seven: Spread chopped hair (human hair is fine) in your garden.

Step Eight: Try using oak leaves as a barrier. Slugs and snails don't like the tannin in the leaves.


I hope this was helpful,Take Care!!! :)

Answer 4

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
how to kill slugs/snails?
I live in San Diego, and have a tiny garden which I love extended from our condo, but it's also surrounded by Ivy, which I guess these annyoing little creatures love and they are eating my garden up. I just read that putting pennies as a barrier around my garden will help and also read to spray...

Answer 5

I kinda doubt the pennies will do much good. Vinegar and water i havent heard about but maybe. It would definately need to be well diluted. I would advise you to get you some small containers like lids to tupperware, etc. -about the size of a plate. Pour in fresh beer and they will swamp to these. They will need to be redone every three days thought as the beer will get gross and smelly. Hope you have somewhere you can tuck these so your kitties cant get to them and get a little tipsy.

The slugs actually drown in the beer while they drink.

Answer 6

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Answer 7

This is kind of gross but if you pour salt directly on the slugs it will kill them. I don't know if it would do any good to spread salt around the perimeter of your garden or not but you might try it.

Answer 8

It may be a little gross, but the best thing to do is go out early in the morning (around dawn) and step on as many as possible. Do this for a few days, then repeat regularly. This should solve the problem once the reproductive cycle is broken.

Good luck....

Answer 9

Just pour a little bit of salt

Answer 10

Table salt