Several years ago, snails appeared in our dacha cooperative, first on the outskirts of the village, and then everywhere. Before that, only slugs bothered us, but last years and those and others. In some areas there were so many snails that summer residents collected them in buckets.
Every morning I looked for them on dahlias, echinocea and horseradish. There were especially many snails on the border with other areas. Neighbors rarely came, the garden was overgrown with weeds, and pests crawled in all directions. No ditches could save us, so these creatures crumbled from the long weeds.
Snails and slugs eat everything: strawberries, vegetables, flowers, leaving behind pathetic twigs, and the fruits they gnaw disappear from fungal diseases or rot from the mucus that mollusks leave behind. During the day, especially in hot weather, they hide under leaves, boards, stones, and in the evening and at night they crawl out onto plants. Despite the fact that snails and slugs are gardeners, destroying dead plants, their huge numbers cause much more harm than the benefits they bring. And therefore we must fight them.
There are different ways.
1. Slugs and snails cannot tolerate the smell of parsley, garlic, sage, rosemary, so these plants, planted around the perimeter of the site, will repel pests.
2. Beds and flower beds can be protected if slaked lime, dolomite flour, crushed superphosphate or ground pepper, and salt are sprinkled around the perimeter. These substances irritate or dehydrate the delicate body and make movement difficult.
3. You can also sprinkle egg shells or fine gravel (?...) around the perimeter of the beds or flower beds, the sharp edges of which prevent crawling.
4. Slugs and snails prefer to eat berries, fruits, and vegetables, so they react to the smell, and, as gardeners have noticed, they really love beer. They can be collected in placed traps: plastic bottles cut in half, cut off the screw part from the neck, pour some beer into a glass, and cover it with the top of the bottle, neck down. Dig this device into the soil. Slugs and snails will crawl into the bottle themselves, but will not be able to get out.
5. In order not to look for these pests throughout the garden, you can lay out boards, cardboard, and rags around the area where they will hide for the day and can be easily collected.
6. There are also chemical means of protection against slugs and snails, for example, the drug Meta, which is scattered over an area of 30 g by 10 m. This drug kills pests, but pets may suffer from it.
7. I recently learned about another method: lay copper wire or rings around the perimeter (beds or flower beds), they will repel, because when they touch, it will cause electricity(?…).This method is new to me, I hope to test its effect in the summer.
In order not to have to fight snails and slugs, it is necessary to deprive them of their daytime shelter: mow the grass regularly, do not leave weeded weeds on the paths, remove boards and logs, and constantly loosen the soil so that they cannot hide there.
http://maltzevaswetl.ru.xsph.ru/?p=195#more-195
Usage hot water against slugs
I heard from gardeners about harmless control methods related to the fact that high temperatures are unbearable for slugs.
One of effective ways when the beds are mulched with transparent film. At night, slugs gather under this film, and during the day, when the soil is heated by the rays of the sun, they die - they cannot withstand the resulting “steam room”.
On hot summer days, when there are no longer open areas of soil between the grown plants, resistant plants can be watered against slugs hot water. Slugs die when treated with water heated to 40 degrees.
For example, cabbage can be watered over the leaves with fairly hot water (60 degrees).
The slugs die immediately as soon as this hot shower hits them. The cabbage does not suffer at all.
Treatment of plants with hot water should be done at dusk, when pests crawl out onto the leaves.
Protecting plants from slugs
To protect individual plants from slugs, it is advisable to use dry mineral fertilizers (potassium salt, superphosphate), scattering them on the soil around the plant. Moreover, such processing alone is not enough. After all, after contact with these substances, slugs, trying to protect themselves from irritation, secrete a large amount of mucus and, along with it, throw off the drug that has fallen on them.
Therefore, the first treatment only has a terrifying effect on slugs, and only the second guarantees complete destruction. The treatment interval is 30-40 minutes.
Special preparations (for example, “Meta”, “Thunderstorm”) also have a lethal effect on pests, but only if they hit the slug directly.
When using “chemicals” against slugs, remember that it is not safe for the garden soil, as well as for the beneficial creatures of the garden, and even for the gardeners themselves!
Pollination with chemicals should be stopped 3 weeks before fruits and berries ripen.
During this period, a mustard solution (150 g of dry mustard per 10 liters of water) can be used to treat plants against pests.
Pollination and spraying of plants against slugs is recommended late in the evening.
Mechanical controls for slugs and snails
Special traps for slugs and snails are a bowl covered with an umbrella-roof. The trap is installed in the ground so that the entrances to it are at the level of the ground surface. The bowl is filled with beer, fruit juice or other bait (the tasty smell attracts snails and slugs), and the roof over it prevents rainwater and debris from getting inside. In the absence of such a trap, pour the bait into simple bowls from an old unnecessary set and dig it flush with the surface of the soil in places with plants, most loved by snails and slugs. Check and empty traps regularly in the morning.
Maneuvers that distract snails and slugs include old leaves and tops scattered near the plantings. garden plants(lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, comfrey, etc.). I successfully use this method in a greenhouse, which helps me keep not only slugs and snails, but also woodlice away from plants. Having become carried away by eating this waste, the pests no longer crawl to the vegetables growing in the greenhouse. I periodically collect drying waste and the pests that eat it, replacing green traps with fresh tops.
Phyto-control agents for slugs and snails
Plants that slugs and snails do not like and try to avoid include, first of all, garlic, as well as many (but not all!) aromatic plants (lavender, sage, hyssop, santolina, thyme or thyme, rosemary, bay, etc. ), which slugs and snails never touch.
Garlic is used by manufacturers for special herbal infusions that repel slugs and other pests from plants. In addition to garlic infusion, bitter pepper infusion and mustard infusion are well-known folk remedies fight against slugs and snails.
http://www.gardenia.ru
There are many ways, including dusting with ash, sprinkling with sand, etc., to make it difficult for them to crawl. Also use mechanical assembly - lay out the planks, and leaves are better burdock. Snails love burdock and gather under it. Place them between the rows, then remove the snails from them. Belkina Svetlana
The poison doesn’t particularly affect them, sprinkle ash or metaldehyde around the plants (it’s called the Thunderstorm of Slugs) in the first case they don’t crawl on dry ground, in the second they burn their belly and die. Elena Orlova
Gather. Sprinkle the most valuable crops around coarse salt or ground eggshell. They won’t crawl over their tender belly. Valentina Lichikova
These pests can be collected and destroyed or fed to chickens. To do this, you need to place pieces of slate in their feeding areas: slugs crawl under them at night, so during the day you just need to turn over the slate and collect the pests.
You can use a poison against slugs - metaldehyde, which is sold under the names "Meta" or "Thunder". Under each cabbage leg, next to the stem, place 3-4 metaldehyde granules. When slugs crawl onto the cabbage at night, they will burn their abdomen on these granules and die. But metaldehyde is a pretty strong poison, and you should be aware of it.
There is an old, ancient method against slugs: dilute 0.25 cups of 9% vinegar in a bucket of water and in the evening pour this solution over the top of the cabbage. There is another recommendation - twist a nettle stalk around the cabbage leg. Slugs are afraid of stings from nettles. True, in a humid summer when there is a large concentration of slugs on the site, they also eat nettles.
There is an interesting observation from gardeners: slugs love beer. In those places where pests have chewed out large holes on the leaves of plants, dig half-liter jars in the evening (the edges of the jars are level with the soil), pour beer on the bottom. The slugs will climb into the jars, flattered by the free drink, but they will not be able to get out of the glass jars; in the morning you will collect them in one jar and fill them with heavily salted water. After death, you can throw the slugs to compost heap, birds will readily peck them. All these methods are also suitable for fighting snails. Galina
Mulch the soil with sawdust. Only if the sawdust is fresh, it is necessary to water it with a urea solution. Rotted sawdust works better. And one more thing: drinking coffee helps a lot. Caffeine, even in small amounts, paralyzes nervous system slugs and they die. Julia
http://ponarodnomu.ru/answers/a_rassada.htm
Under tomato, pepper or eggplant plants, which slugs are big fans of, you can place dried nettle plants. Slugs are afraid of them, and if there are a lot of nettles, they will prefer to avoid this place. Treat me to a beer! Slugs and snails cannot resist beer, even when it has expired (they are true connoisseurs of this drink and, according to German gardeners, prefer its dark varieties). You can take advantage of this addiction by digging glasses into the ground and filling them halfway with beer. Those who are especially immoderate simply drown in beer; those who are more temperate “fall off” next to the “life-giving source.” The method is original and, as they say, very effective - two or three such “feasts” and you can forget about slugs until the end of the season.
Instead of glasses, other containers will do. For example, in the lowest areas you can install a whole basin, or you can get by with glasses made from plastic bottles. Or take whole plastic bottles, pour in some beer and lay them flat on the ground, crumpling one side a little so that the bottles become flat and don’t roll around.
It is worth noting that mollusks especially avoid substrates such as ash, superphosphate or lime. Superphosphate, by today's standards, is, of course, an expensive thing, so it's easier to stick with ash or lime. Perhaps the simplest remedy is to sprinkle lime between the rows after rain or watering, when the slugs begin to actively move. When they fall on strips of lime, they burn their abdomen and die. You can take not pure lime, but mixed with ash or tobacco dust (1:1).
In the absence of rain, the soil is cultivated in this way late in the evening or at night, when the slugs are on the soil or on the plants. Soil treatment is repeated periodically (every 7-15 days), which leads to the gradual death of mollusks. The main thing when carrying out this procedure is to successfully select places for dispersing drugs in order to block the slugs’ main routes of movement. It should be borne in mind that filing is effective when the slugs are “grazing” - that is, after sunset.
You can sprinkle the ground with powders, for example, finely crushed iron sulfate mixed with sand. Slugs die from contact with this mixture. Very corrosive to slugs and soot. They do not like dry sawdust and avoid places coated with tar. The bushes were protected from them by making a ring of cotton wool, five cm wide, at the base of the trunk and coating it with tar or any sticky resin.
To protect garden strawberries, it is recommended to sprinkle the ground with spruce or pine needles or place a layer of spruce or pine paws on the soil. The needles will fall to the surface by themselves and serve as protection against slugs. In addition, they will protect the soil from drying out and then serve as fertilizer. And the skeletons of spruce and pine legs will serve as support for the berries, protecting them from contact with the ground. For dessert - grapefruit. 
American gardeners recommend a very original way of catching slugs using grapefruits: just take half a grapefruit peel, cut a small hole in it and install this dome-shaped trap. Attracted by the smell, the gastropods will gather under the peel overnight, and in the morning all that remains is to collect them and eliminate them by placing them in boiling water or a concentrated solution of table salt. However, in our conditions it is easier to catch slugs in more accessible (and most importantly - available at any garden plot) traps. For the latter, ordinary cuttings of boards, pieces of slate or roofing felt, wet rags and burlap, linoleum, watermelon rinds, cabbage leaves, etc. are quite suitable - slugs like to crawl into such shelters for the day. And all you need to do is lay out all these items in the evening in suitable places, and in the morning go through and collect the mollusks hidden in the traps.
But here you need to regularly ensure that there are no gaps in the wall through which an insidious and voracious enemy can penetrate. Crushed river shells with sharp edges, which are scattered in ribbons between the beds, are considered an excellent means of repelling slugs.
http://www.vashsad.ua/plants/room_plants/vermin/articles/show/5896/
soak 1 kg of tobacco waste in 10 liters of water for a day, mix with green soap, strain and spray the plants;
Spray the leaves with a spray gel for stickiness, then sprinkle them with ground black pepper;
in the evening, water the plants from a watering can with a solution of ammonia (4 tablespoons per bucket of water); the product is harmless to plants;
water the crops with delphinium tincture (finely chop a pound of leaves and leave in a bucket warm water two days), mustard (100 g per bucket of water), hot pepper (1 kg of fresh or 0.5 kg of dry pods, pour a bucket of water, leave for 2-3 days, boil and leave for another 2 days);
water with 0.01% coffee solution: dissolve a double dose of instant coffee in a cup of water.
When at rest, the mollusks are wide and short. When muscles contract, they suddenly become thinner and longer. On the surface of the body, such creatures secrete a large amount of mucus in the form of foam. It is necessary to protect it from drying out in too hot weather. This substance also prevents the slug from injuring its body during friction when it moves.
Their body color is gray-brown. In the head section, the mollusk has two pairs of special tentacles. At the end of the first are the eyes. The second pair is designed for tactile sensations.
Slugs are nocturnal. IN daytime they carefully hide under the shade of strawberry leaf blades or under wood. Under the influence ultraviolet radiation these animals quickly dry out, which leads to their rapid death.
Harmful mollusks live for about 1-2 years. They lay their eggs once a year. Their number does not exceed forty pieces. After one month, the eggs hatch into full-fledged mollusks. They can grow to adult size in a couple of months.
When do they appear on strawberries?
Slugs most often feed not only on ripe young strawberries, but they also love the juicy leaves of this plant. In addition to this, there are several more important factors appearance of this pest on fruit beds:
- too hot summer;
- excessively high level productivity;
- unkempt area with big amount weeds;
- a large amount of dead organic matter in the garden bed;
- overly waterlogged and dense soil;
- high density of strawberry rows.
Signs
The presence of slugs in your garden beds can be determined by several signs:
- the appearance of deformed fruits;
- the presence of white mucus inside the berries;
- formation of holes on leaf blades;
- small silvery spots on plants.
Fighting methods
Many gardeners prefer traditional methods in the fight against slugs.
- Infusion of hot pepper. Fresh vegetables (one kilogram) are filled with water (10 liters). In this form, everything is left to infuse for two days. Afterwards the broth is boiled for an hour. It is cooled and the pods are thoroughly ground. The liquid is placed in a cool place for a short time. Then they take it out and spray it on diseased seedlings.
- Sprinkle with eggshells or nut shells. To protect strawberries from snails, the ground around them is treated with this component. In this case, such a product acts as a prickly barrier for slugs.
- Applying dry soil. These mollusks love moist areas, so in order to completely get rid of them, a layer of dried soil is poured onto the ground. This should be done after you water the plants.
- A solution with ammonia and vinegar. To make this composition, you need to mix them with water (1 part of the components to 6 parts of water). Afterwards, the infected stems and leaf blades are thoroughly treated with the resulting solution.
Gardeners often use various baits for them. So, you can place old boards, plywood or even roofing felt near the strawberry rows. It is also recommended to moisten the ground on which they will be located with water, this will further attract pests that quickly accumulate on such materials.
In order to get rid of these animals, you can scatter them in different parts of your summer cottage sharp barriers (pine branches, sharp gravel, sawdust, river sand). These mollusks cannot overcome such obstacles due to their special body structure.
Most gardeners in the fight against snails prefer proven and effective chemicals.
Prevention
To prevent slugs from appearing in strawberry beds at all, you need to do some procedures regularly. Do not forget to promptly remove all debris and organic residues from the soil.
Remember that you should not feed them to poultry (chickens, roosters, ducks). After all, these mollusks are often carriers of various infections, which can cause animals to get sick and die.
Remember that they are also repelled by various odorous plants. Such plantings include garlic, sage and rosemary. You cannot water the rows too often. Excessively moist soil will only attract slugs and contribute to their spread.
Some gardeners advise planting strawberry seedlings in artificial raised beds. Their height must be at least 30 centimeters. Also, many advise periodically removing thickening from berry beds, as it attracts slugs and some other pests. To do this, the rows of seedlings need to be thinned out.
Do not forget to regularly weed and loosen the soil with strawberry plants. These procedures can be replaced by mulching. To prepare mulch, pine branches or chopped sawdust are most often used.
– it’s quite a difficult matter. These garden monsters appear only at night or on cloudy days; the rest of the time they are quite difficult to notice, as they hide under the foliage. Most often, it is strawberries that suffer from them. How to deal with this problem, and how to protect your crop from these parasites?
Know the enemy by sight
Slugs on strawberries are quite dangerous pests that love plants with large and delicate leaves. They live mainly in dense thickets and places with high humidity. The main harm is that they literally eat vegetables and fruits and significantly spoil them appearance. After their appearance, a shiny mark remains on the products. It is quite difficult to get rid of, and it really ruins your appetite.
In order to save strawberries from slugs, you can turn to the help of various chemicals. However, this should be done strictly before the first fruits appear. If the berries are already ripe, then the use of chemicals is unacceptable, as they will make the product extremely toxic.
Another way to protect the harvest is to use ash. It can be obtained from a regular fire. It is necessary to sprinkle the strawberry bushes directly on top, which will make them very dirty and not attractive to pests. The ash itself is not hazardous to human health and is washed off quite simply.
A practically safe remedy for humans is the use of mustard powder. To do this, it must be diluted in water until a strong solution is formed. If necessary, you can add table salt and treat the bushes with the resulting product. Such spraying is detrimental to the delicate skin of pests, which will allow you to get rid of most of them.
Another amazing and pretty in a simple way is the use of instant coffee. Recent studies have shown that caffeine has a detrimental effect on slugs and snails, so spraying with a regular coffee solution can be used to combat them.
By following our simple tips, you can easily rid your garden of uninvited guests. As you can see, all the methods are quite simple, but it’s up to you to judge the effectiveness!
Slug attacks on strawberry plants often become a big disappointment for gardeners who do not want to share their harvest with these pests. Let's see what we can do to protect your berries.
Slugs are soft-bodied land mollusks without shells. Most of them feed on your strawberries at night, and during the day you can easily determine their presence by the characteristic traces of silvery mucus and damaged berries. The bad thing is that after the slugs, the damaged strawberries are attacked by other pests and diseases, access to which is opened by the damage.
To prevent slugs from becoming a problem for you, remove any debris, leaves and rocks that could harbor mollusks. Check to see if watering creates excess moisture that attracts slugs. If harmful mollusks are detected, reduce watering if possible, ideally switch to drip irrigation.
At the beginning of the season, some producers use small but effective tricks to prevent slug visits. They use plastic mulch or grow plants on black polyethylene covers because the clams don't like hot surfaces.
The most convenient time to identify these pests is at dusk. Wait about two hours after sunset, grab a flashlight and go searching. It is enough to carry out a preventive inspection once a week, but when there are a lot of slugs, you should not be lazy and conduct a raid every evening. After all, the safety of the harvest depends on it! Place the collected pests in a bucket of soapy water and then destroy them.
Another common control method is to create barriers from diatomaceous earth or wood ash. But we must remember that such barriers lose all effectiveness if they get wet. There are commercial slug barrier products available that contain copper. When copper reacts with the mucus produced by the mollusk, the latter gets very unpleasant sensations and leaves the affected area. Slug barriers are created in a single line around the strawberry plants.
Do not use salt to create barriers! This increases the salinity of the soil, which is harmful to plants.
The third known method is to set traps. They may be different. For example, take a container that is deep and long enough, dig it level with the ground next to the garden bed, and then fill it halfway with beer. Slugs will not be able to resist the enchanting aroma of beer and, most likely, will safely drown during the tasting process.
Another trap option could be a simple wooden plank, slightly raised by pebbles, under which slugs will find their refuge and, ultimately, death from the owner of the site. To attract pests, place apple peelings, potato pieces and lettuce under the board. Also, crush one slug on the board and turn the board over and place it on the damp soil. A dead slug will attract living slugs, if there are any on the site. Such a trap must be checked in the morning, pests collected and the bait replaced.
You can easily and simply make a slug trap from a simple newspaper by rolling the sheets into a tube and securing the edges with electrical tape or paper clips so that the newspaper does not unfold. Place the resulting tunnel next to the strawberry plants and leave it for one day and overnight. Check in the morning - slugs like to hide in narrow, dark places.
After repelling the attacks of slugs, help strawberry plants restore strength and immunity by spraying them with liquid foliar fertilizers from the Folirus line - you can purchase foliar fertilizers for strawberries. We wish you a successful season and lots of delicious berries!