After reading Lady Dazzles post about flies ( disgusting horrible things ) it has prompted me to ask if anyone knows how to keep slugs at bay ? If there is anything worse than flies it has got to be slugs (uurgh - makes me sick just thinking about them ) :(
I have tubs of flowers on the patio and I am sick of going out in the evening to find a million slugs about.....I dont want to have to move the flowers as they look so pretty at the moment but does anyone have any tips ???
Lel

Hi Lel

Wrap some thin copper wire around the pots and the slugs won't cross it. Apparently it emits just enough charge to create your own mini electric fence to keep them from touching it to cross :)
Lara x

Wow i havent heard that before !!

only i short term measure i know but i send out my littleun with a tub of salt! :P
Liz

watch out Lizzy or you'll have the slug-hugger after you!

My mum does this as well and my daughter calls her 'Grandma the slug murderer' ! She loves it and helps Grandma out when she goes to stay !

Lucy

Slugs like beer apparently. So leave a dish of beer out at night and I guess either the slugs are too drunk to attack your plants or they drown in it with a happy smile! :)
Sandy

I wondered if there was any tips to stop them coming onto the patio area in the first place . I couldnt do the beer (yuk) seeing them all there - mind you i might make me teetotal !! :)
Neither could I do the salt as I hate seeing them afterwards . I really do have a bit of a phobia about them as they are so gross :(
Lel

Slugs are disgusting! Vile vile creatures. I like the mini-electric fence idea though! :D

Well I have a story to really gross you out then lel ;)

About 2 weeks ago ...I went into the kitchen , the light was out and the time was about 10pm. I flicked the switch on and there ..to be horror and disgust , were about 20-30 slugs! They were EVERYWHERE!

After much cleaning up and putting outside of the vile things we started scratching our heads as to where they could have come from! The only thing we can think of is that one has got in ...maybe on Hudson , and then it had slunk under the kitchen unit and had babies (eggs??) which had hatched out. How long they had lived under there I have no idea ..some of them were HUGE! Hudson used to have his water bowl in front of this unit and he is a very messy drinker ..we reckon enough water must of slopped out of the bowl and under the unit to make a nice environment for them. The night they all came out had been a particularly warm one and Hudson had had his water bowl outside ..we think they came out looking for water.

The unit itself is a fixed one so we couldnt do much except clean the WHOLE kitchen and lay salt down along all the edges. Hudsons water bowl has been moved too.

Thankfully we haven't seen another one in the house since then :D

Melody

Melody :( :( :( :(
I swear I would have had to move house .
Years ago when we were looking for our first house we veiwed one and in the kitchen it was all wood panelling on the walls and you could see all the slimy horrible trails that they leave all over the wood . :(
What on earth are they here for anyway - most things have a purpose but unless they are only here to scare the living daylights out of me I cant see why :(
Lel ( who now has goosebumps )

I'm surprised that any of you ever see a slug. I thought they were ALL in my garden :D :D :D

Love the copper wire idea :)

Sharp grit either around your pots or around the perimeter of the patio should stop them :)
Liz :)

Bran is another method I have heard people use - give it dry, they eat it and it swells up in side and they burst!

I go out on slug hunts in the evenings and save them for my chickens - can't let them hunt themselves as they dig up all the plants the dogs have missed - this results in a very quick death. I have also been know to squash them but it leaves such a mess.

Christine

yeeeeeeuuuuuuuuuuuuuch Christine - do you have a side line in horror movie special effects!!!

Pam n the boys

Well, if any of you own Ferrets as I do, you will know that slugs are a delicacy! a Ferret equivalent of Caviar! However don't save them for me as I have plenty here!!
Dawn.

Darn! I'll undo the package then..... ;)

Maybe thats the answer then - I should buy a ferret :D
Lel

Aaaah thats alright then lel.

But have you thought how you are going to pick them up to give to the Ferrets. :-d :-d

I hate slugs to, but not quite as much as the dreaded SPIDERS!!!!!

Jayne ;-)

Jayne
I'm not a lover of spiders but I would rather touch a great big hairy spider than a slimy slug :( :(

The knack is to carry the Ferret to the slug, they pick it up, then they munch it, all squelchy and squishy it is. :D
Dawn.

Dawn!!! bleurghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

He heheehehe, my dad used to send me out with a toasting fork, and i had to stab them, and then drown them in a milk bottle of salty water.
I hate stepping on them, they go make a really orrible popping sound! I also hate cuddling a dog, and then finding a slug on it!

Spiders are KEWL! fantastic creatures! Teganaria Gigantea, (thats the hairy chappie who wanders around your house scaring you) is amazing, bizarrely for spiders, the big one is the male and the little one the female, its usually the other way round.
They have a fantastic in built body clock, i have one here, behind my puter, he comes out at bang on 15 past nine, every night! and always walks around the room clockwise!

They also have hydraulic legs, they pump them full of fluid to extend them, and drain them to retract. Brilliant.

The wolf spider, (not in this country) can memorise an exact route to a food source, even though when she has set off, the route is no longer visible to her, AND an alternative route, which from her view point looks correct is! Thats good going for something with a brain the size of a pin head!

Also, female spiders are ace, the male annoys her, doesnt bring her a gift before the nuptials commence, she EATS him! Yay, girl power!
Some spider ladies like the bondage, the male sneaks up and ties her down by the legs to mate, or she will eat him!

House spiders are VERY territorial, so if you are going around your house removing them, more will move in, and, because the new tenants are looking for a place to build a web, you will in fact see more of them. So, leave them alone, learn what time they come out, and you will be safe from them, unless its breeding season (summer) in which case, you will see lots of them about, sometimes several in one place, all looking for spider nookie!

One word of warning though, it is a common myth that spiders cannot puncture human skin, yes, they can, and they will, under certain circumstances. I had an argument about this with a friend, who believed they could not bite, adn to prove my point, i 'annoyed' a house spider, and a garden spider. They both bit me, and drew blood, and it does hurt a lil, but no worse than a bee sting.
Spiders are only likely to bite if prodded when they are trapped, or if trapped inside clothing, or brushed against in undergrowth.

The thing i really hate, is cockroaches!!!!!!!! id sleep on the streets before id set foot in a house with roaches in it!

Em

Lel

You could try wrapping your house and garden in copper wire!!! :D

Do you live in a wet area, we live in a dry sandy, stony, heathland area, I hardly ever see a slug, only a few where we have a lot of rain, doesn't seem to stop the snails unfortunately, they seem to have taken a liking to my yucca :(

Hayley

Lel,

Try double sided tape around the pat they stick to it or don't go near it . Doesn't hurt the dog either.

Karen

hi,

I just had to say i don`t mind the slugs, or the spiders, but i CAN`T STAND FORKITAILS!!!!!!!! (earwigs), they are soooo evil with their little pinchers, I will be in the kitchen making a cuppa....when there is a scream that can be heard from miles around...I can here my hubby in the front room " she`s found another one!" then i start dancing around the kitchen (you`d think it was a mouse or a rat that had disturbed my tea making!!)
sorry, but i had to get that off my chest...

leesa.

Have to say , I am exactly the same about earwigs ...they scare me to death! Whilst I don't like beetles , spiders , millipedes etc etc ,earwigs terrify me!!
:)

Had an earwig invasion in my kennels about three years ago - they were everywhere :(. I still occasionally find them in my roses, they climb up the plant and hang out in the blooms. They make me shudder :(
Lara x

When I was at college I went one day to the bakers over the road for a sandwich.

Part way through, I opened it up to rearrange the salad filling and found a large black slug sittting in the next mouthful.

What didn't come back up went back to the shop for a refund!! :(

I've disliked them ever since -strangely enough.

I use salt if they are on the patio, but put sand round tender plants. Haven't yet seen any this year.

Julia & Hooligans

Julia
re; the black slug in the sandwich - eeeeeeuuuurgghhh :( :(
how on earth did they explain that .
O my god , imagine if you hadnt checked . Thats one reason I never eat "fresh homegrown veggies" .
I Remember years ago when i was a kid and dad had a go at growing his own produce . We had cauliflower cheese one night and there was a massive caterpillar inside one of the florets . Gross :(

Could have been worse - could have been half a slug or caterpillar found :D
Lara x

Lel

There was absolutely no attempt to explain it!!! They just said Oh sorry and gave me a refund.

Thanks for the bit about Caulis....I'm just growing some in pots on the patio (The Small One wanted to plant something)

Julia

***** NEWSFLASH *****
Some useless information just in

Humans, on average, eat 8 spiders in their lifetime.

Ha, ha Spider haters!! LOL

Norm

I still can't do the smiley thing I don't have 'help' in the top right hand corner.

Norm
for a smiley face press : and then immediately do ) - without any spaces inbetween . Et Voila !!!When you post it will convert to a smiley face !!

Wrong way round Lel :D It is : - ) but with no spaces :-)

Sorry I didnt mean add the hyphen as well - thats just me using grammer for once :)

:-) Have I done it?

Yippee I CAN do it :-)

Norm :D
try this one now
: and then D
:D

Oh my gawd I could not touch a spider and am terrified of them. I would rather touch a slug - well I would rather not. I am sorry to say any spiders in the house get squashed by husband in case they come in again - he hates killing them but is more worried about the screaming mess by his side :p .

Yuck horrible things phobias arent they?

Gina :)

I am petrified of spiders... I can't kill them, so I get my other half to gently put them outside. I get the shakes and have to force myself to go into a room where a spider is... urrrgh... I keep thinking of their hairy legs!! I don't like any creepy crawlies though, flies, wasps (evil), spiders, earwigs, woodlice (gross)... and I live on an old farm with a cowfield next door and we get the biggest horseflys - urrrrgh!!!!

Why do spiders go into the bath in the first place? (And the ones we have are large enough to catch mice! )

When we moved in here there were fifty big dead ones in the bottom of the bath... mum had to push them down the plug hole with a broom handle because they were so big they wouldn't wash down :( I was being sick... thats how bad I get!!

Ah ha, the drop in from the ceiling, because the bath is usually a pale colour, its is likely to attract flying insects, mmmmmm spider dinners.
Unfortunately, they then cant get out, and ooooooooh dear, someone washes them down the plug. Still, most spiders can cliimb back out of the plug hole later on, when your not looking.
I leave a strip of loo roll over the edge of the bath, and they remove themselves!

Ooooooooooh, and errrrr, dont buy one of those 'spider preventer' plug hole covers, they would only work if the spider did actually originate from the plug hole, which aint the case!

You can get plug in doodahs, that emit a high frequency noise that spiders do not like, errrrrrr, either they leave home, or i think they explode, however i have my suspicions that they may affect dogs and cats too (dont think they will explode, but think they wuldnt lik eit)

Em

:D brilliantly put,Em!!!
:D

"most spiders can climb back out of the plughole when youre not looking".......not if you pour boiling water on them 1st they cant!:D

Sam , you meany :(
They keep the flies at bay

Ive got a cat for that purpose Lel :D

You could try running them over with a lawn mower, works with mice and rats apparently:D (The slugs that is, might even work with spiders too:D)
Bev:rolleyes:

EEEEEEEE
what if they splatter on me (
Lel

EEEEEEEE
what if they splatter on me :(
Lel

A few years ago, I was on holiday in a very nice hotel in Florida. Our room was on the 2nd floor, and for some strange reason, I kept waking up at about 3 am - very unusual for me. One morning, I woke again at 3 am but this time I felt a sharp pain in my little finger. I turned on the light, threw back the bed covers and to my horror, there were something like 50 cockroaches in bed with me and my husband. According to the Manager, they must have been desperate because they don't usually bite!! This was one of the grossest experiences that I have ever had. They are bad enough when you encounter them on the floor, but as bed guests - ugh - I hate cockroaches with a passion. (My husband was in the "altogether", he's convinced that they were all nesting on his privates - nuff said there).