In high season, gardeners and gardeners have to deal with many different problemsstarting from weeding and removing the ubiquitous weeds and ending with the fight against various pests.
And some of them can be called a disaster, because because of their voracity and insatiability, they able to harm many commercial crops.
One of them is a slug, a clam, whose "diet" includes more than a hundred cultivated plants. He is always willing to eat stalks, buds, leaves and the fruits of many vegetables, so every self-respecting gardener should know: how to get rid of this annoying and unwanted "neighbor."
general information
The first sign of the presence of slugs in the garden are small holes with traces of silver color appearing on the leaves of vegetable and fruit crops. In nature, there are many types of slugs.
At the same time, these pests give the greatest preference to plants with large juicy leaves, for example, cabbage or beets, eating not only their green part, but also the fruits themselves.
In addition, slugs are very fond of ripe strawberries and strawberries, and even tomatoes and potatoes that are not very attractive for many other pests. You can fight them with chemical and folk remedies.
How to fight?
On cabbage
Cabbage slugs and caterpillars can be a real disaster for the gardener. Cabbage pests can be viewed on the photo. So, slugs on cabbage: how to deal with them? You can poison them such ways:
Chemicals:
- Metaldehyde. The granules of this pesticide must be scattered in the beds with vegetables and berry bushes. Slugs eat it and soon die from acute intestinal poisoning. This tool is considered the most effective.
- Slaked lime and copper sulfate in powder form. After watering or rain they pollinate the cabbage spacing. Caustic substances, hitting the clam's belly, cause severe burns on his tender skin, causing the slug to die. Such treatments are best performed during the period of high activity of slugs, falling in the evening.
- Oven ash and bleach.
- Tobacco dust, etc.
What the slugs look like on cabbage, see photo below.
Folk ways:
How to treat cabbage from slugs?
- Exhausted beer. To do this, near the heads you need to place plastic cups, half filled with beer, dug them into the ground for stability.
As early as the morning after such an operation, you will see dead pests who regale a frothy drink.The procedure must be repeated two or three times, and slugs can be safely forgotten until the end of the season;
- Rind of grapefruit. In half of the skin, removed from an exotic fruit, make small holes-entrances and place them throughout the site.
The slugs lured in by their pleasant scent will climb into such traps, but they will not be able to get out of them. So in the morning it will be necessary only to collect them and destroy;
- If cabbage is eaten by slugs: what to do? You can use roofing material, trim boards and pieces of burlap. These traps must be placed on vegetable beds and leave for a day. When the slugs crawl there for the "night", you need to collect them and destroy.
On pepper
Often the slug eats leaves of sweet bell pepper, eating huge holes in them, which causes great damage to plants and negatively affects their development and yield. Thus, the slugs on the peppers cause great damage to the gardener.
Protection is as follows:
Chemicals:
- Preparations based on metaldehyde ("Thunderstorm", "Meta"). Such a "treat" will attract the mollusks and lead them to inevitable death. In addition, metaldehyde-based chemicals have low toxicity. and do not harm the environment, including earthworms that inhabit the beds.
- Superphosphate. To achieve the desired effect, the peppers should be powdered with this fertilizer, taking it at a rate of 30-40 mg / m3.
Slugs on pepper: how to deal with them in folk ways?
- A solution of white vinegar. To prepare the working solution is taken ½ cup of vinegar per 10-liter bucket of water. Spray the plants themselves and the soil beneath them. It is best to do this in the evening when the pests go to feed;
- Boiling water. The soft, tender body of slugs is very afraid of fever. Moreover, even 40 degrees Celsius that are harmless to many plants can be destructive for them. So, in order to remove the slugs from bell peppers, they simply need to be poured with water brought to a temperature of +60 degrees Celsius;
- Eggshell. Another good way to get rid of the "annoying neighbor" in our garden: scatter broken eggshells on the beds, the sharp edges of which injure the delicate skin of mollusks, leaving deep cuts on it. Thus, they will be destroyed in a short time.
On cucumbers
One of the most popular crops, grown on many summer cottages are cucumbers. However, their slugs are not avoided, spoiling the quantity and quality of the future harvest. In most cases, they choose young fruits, hence the question arises: How to protect yourself from slugs on young cucumbers?
And they feel completely at ease not only in the open field, but also in greenhouses and greenhouses.
That is, gardeners are faced with a rather serious problem: how to preserve and protect vegetables, to get a good crop of cucumbers in the shortest possible time?
This requires the following measures:
- Regular inspection of plants and cleanliness in the greenhouse. It should not contain plant waste, pieces of covering material and other debris. Thus, it is possible to prevent the appearance of slugs and other pests in it.
- The construction of obstacles to the advancement of mollusks. A good option: clean river sand, which will make their movements even slower and more difficult.
- Creating shelter traps from old rags, burdocks, boards and pieces of cardboard.
In difficult cases, chemical treatment is recommended, with using preparations with metaldehyde.
On tomatoes
Tomatoes are also one of the favorite "dishes" of slugs, which they eat with great appetite and hunting.
Therefore, the most important task of any gardener is the prompt and competent decision of the question: How to remove these unpleasant creatures from your site?
You can do this as follows:
- spreading dried nettles under tomato plants, which these pests fear like fire. Such a simple manipulation will discourage them from trying to "attempt" on these plants;
- making for the slugs "obstacle strip" of ash and slaked lime;
- watering garden crops infusion of garlic or onions, which the mollusks cannot bear "to the spirit";
- prevent thickening landings. The optimal landing scheme: 60x70 and 70x70 cm.
On potatoes
The ubiquitous and almost omnivorous slugs do not bypass the side and another vegetable, enjoying great love and respect of many gardeners. This is, of course, potatoes, foliage and tubers which they eat, causing great harm to plants.
That is, it is very important to know how to protect this agricultural crop and, if necessary, quickly remove from it a voracious pest.
To remove a slug on potatoes, you can use one of the simple but effective ways, for example:
- Sprinkle potato tops with tincture of wormwood.
- Placing between bushes leaves and roots of horseradish, which will scare away the pests.
- Scattered on the beds finely crushed river shells.
When fighting a shellfish in this way, it’s necessary to keep an eye on so that in the “rough obstacle” no loopholes were formed, along which the pest can easily penetrate to potatoes and other plants.
On strawberry
If slug treats potatoes and tomatoes rather cool and eats them in fairly rare cases, he eats juicy, ripe strawberries with great pleasure, see the photo on the right.
Often on the pitted and deformed fruits, The pests that appeared on the beds after a night hunt are familiar enough to almost every gardener.
What to do in such cases? Of course, fight. Moreover, there are very simple ways that allow you to get rid of slugs on strawberries quickly and efficiently.
For example:
- land mulching between berry bushes with conifer needles (best spruce). Despite their voracity, these mollusks will not risk getting to them by the prickly "pine carpet" and your landing will be safe;
- seating around the perimeter of strawberry beds and in the center of parsley, which is an excellent deterrent to the pest;
- processing of berry bushes with a strong solution of table salt.
On cherry
Fight Cherry Slugs You can use the so-called "sweet traps" made from jars or boxes of sour cream or yogurt, filled with kvass, fruit juice or juice, and fixed around the trunk of a tree.
Climbing into such traps they can't get out of there so they will only need to collect and destroy. Update traps need to do every day, in the morning.
Useful tips
The favorite habitat of slugs are soils with strong moisture, overgrown with thick grass in which they hide from the sun's rays. So, their appearance in the garden can be prevented by diverting standing water from the backyard plot and removing excess vegetation from it.
That is, the best prevention of combating these pests will be regular weeding and mowing grass on the edges of the site. It is also necessary to clean household and construction debris into it in a timely manner, since slugs like to settle on its heaps.
Good help in the fight against annoying clams their natural enemies can render: animals eating them with great pleasure.
Want to know how to get slugs out of the lot once and for all? Settle a hedgehog, gray or green toads on it, and this question will be solved by itself.
In addition, garden crops can be planted with collecting plants that the pest does not like. These include mint, wormwood, lemon balm and tansy.
Conclusion
In a word, fight with slugs on the plotor in the basement, it will be sufficiently effective provided regular and high-quality care for him.
If the "cunning villain" still managed to penetrate your garden, you can get rid of him without much difficulty with one of the popular methods of the people.
Almost all of them are quite simple, safe and effective. Well, in severely neglected cases, you can use chemicals that contain metaldehyde. And you can forget about unpleasant neighbors once and for all.
Useful video!
