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How To Get Rid Of Slugs Permanently Without Ruining Your Gardens With Chemicals

These slimy molluscs have sneaked into my garden, often eating up my labor of love. Have you had similar problems and did not know what to do? Here is a bang on tutorial for those who love their garden too much to let dangerous chemicals sneak in and how to get rid of slugs permanently.

What are Slugs?

Slugs are molluscs that may or may not have an exterior hardened shell on them. Their bodies are mostly made up of water. They continuously generate protective mucus which is quintessential for their survival. This slimy mucus is the first sign in your planters or garden that you have these uninvited guests.

How To Get Rid Of Slugs Permanently

Are Slugs harmful? Will they harm your pets? No, but they slither into the garden and can eat away a lot of your plants. If you let them have their way, a healthy yard can be turned into a mess in no time.

But how do you make sure that these creatures are inside your garden? In the beginning, you will start seeing mucus trails in your gardens around your plants, or if you see half-eaten leaves that resemble Swiss cheese, you can be sure that they are conspicuously hiding and will come out at night in the damp places.

Prevention is better than cure. Don’t let these little pests take over your garden. Claim it and eliminate them before it is too late. Let us see a few ways we can prevent them from infiltrating into your garden.

How To Get Rid Of Slugs Permanently

Here are the things you will need to address this problem. Most of the items here are from your kitchen cabinet and some of the tools that a gardener ought to have. 

  • A pair of sturdy gardening gloves
  • A bucket
  • Soapy water
  • Honey and yeast combined with water to give a gluey consistency
  • Beer
  • Epsom salt
  • Copper tapes
  • A headlamp
  • A rake
  • A multipurpose spray bottle

How To Get Rid Of Slugs Permanently?

To eliminate these pests from your house and garden, you need the following essentials. These are:

  • Am somebody that believes chemical pesticides need to be the last resort. There is enough pollution in the sand and the waterways due to the indiscriminate use of pesticides.
  • Chemical slug baits may be well-nigh advertised as being completely safe, but according to my research, they contain toxins that can hurt or kill a lot of beneficial creatures like the earthworms.
  • Slugs are hardy pests, and so normal insecticides don’t typically work efficiently unless they are slug specialists. But more on the best products for slugs later on.
  • This tutorial, we shall also address a couple of ways that slug infestations can be kept at bay.

1) Begin with Ascertaining If There Are Slugs in Your Garden

There are various ways to handle the bugs from taking control of your plantation. Some tend to work quickly, whereas some need lots of patience and time. However, there are no shortcuts!

You need to keep trying to find the best method that helps you. Here are some of the natural techniques to ward off the large and small species.

2) Here is How to Weed Them Out Manually

Use a headlamp in the night to individually check for slug infestation. You can carry a bucket with warm soapy water and rivet them out with a stick dropping them in the bucket. Look particularly on the underside of the leaves. Manually weeding helps in a big case but it can be a difficult job.

Method 1:

In that case, you could create a slug trap with organic materials. Use a wide-rimmed glass bottle and bury it in the garden patch, where you suspect the slug population to be very high. The rim of the container must be outside the soil. Fill the bottle with one inch of beer.

The slugs will be attracted to the sweet and fermented smell of the beer and fall into their death. Regular cleaning of the trap is recommended.

Method 2:

You could try a trap with yeast, honey, and water that is mixed to a gluey consistency. The stickiness in the mixture will not allow the slugs to free and climb outside.

Tip: you must protect these traps from rain by setting up a shelter so that the concentrate in the trap does not ger diluted.

Method 3: Epsom salt

Sprinkling Epsom salt is also a good way to keep the slugs away. When the slugs come in contact with the salt, it acts as a dehydrating agent that dries up the moisture from their bodies eventually leading to their death.

Word of Caution: table salt is believed to also desiccate or dehydrate the slugs but unlike Epsom salt that contains magnesium and which is good for the soil, the table salt can actually reduce the moisture in the soil thereby damaging the plants.

Method 4: Garlic spray works wonders too!

Slugs hate very strong smells. An organic spray made with mixing a few crushed garlic with equal parts water and vinegar can be sprayed on the plants that have slug infestation. The smell will put them off so much that they will vacate the place before you even replace the spray bottle on your cabinet.

Method 5: Copper is useful is warding them away

Copper traps made with foils or tapes are very useful when you contour the plants. Make sure that the foil is high enough for the slugs to not bridge in.

Caution must be exercised as the foil and the tape can be sharp enough to hurt children and pets. Copper gives out a natural shock to the slugs that want to keep away from it.

Method 6: Copper is useful is warding them away

Almost all of the tricks should work but if you are impatient and want to use market bought solutions then you must go in for the Monterey LG6500 Organic Sluggo.

It contains iron phosphate which is already present in the soil. The granular consistency is also effective in piercing the soft body of the slugs and killing them instantaneously.

Sluggo is odor-free and long-lasting even after rains. All you have to do is sprinkle Sluggo on the soil and wait for the slugs to die right in front of your eyes!

Here are a few tricks t​o keep slugs away

  • Rake up the excess moisture from the ground and keep it dry
  • Water the garden in the morning so that by evening the soil is dry
  • Do not allow organic mulches to accumulate in the garden because they become an ideal breeding ground for the slugs and the snails.
  • Introduce natural predators of the slugs such as frogs, birds, and ducks that will take care of their population.
  • Grow plants such as California poppy, begonia, and lavender that naturally puts off the slugs.
  • Ensure that there is a lot of space between the plants so that there is circulation on air and no hiding places for the slugs.

Conclusion

Slugs can do untold damage to your garden if not checked in time. This is particularly true because the rate at which they reproduce mean that they can colonise your paradise in less than a few weeks.

All the above tips have been tried and tested. We vouch that using one or more in combination will vacate those slimy pests altogether.

Do you think there is a trick that we left out? Do let us know if you found any of the tips here helpful. What are the things you do to claim your garden back from slugs? As always, we are waiting to hear from you.