Slugs and their snail cousins \u200b\u200bhave become permanent residents of our sites. Everything would be fine, only their number grows steadily every year, as well as the amount of spoiled crops in the garden. In the evening, you rejoice at the young shoots, and in the morning on the garden bed you can see only shiny smears of mucus and excrement of pests. You can fight slugs using both chemical methods and environmentally friendly folk remedies.
Bio methods
The microorganisms are diluted with water and the crop beds are spilled. Within 7 days, gastropods die, and nematodes live in the soil for about a month and wait for new victims. True, it is difficult to get such a drug, since its shelf life is only a month, and then the microorganisms die.
You can attract animals and birds to the site that feed on slugs
Snails and slugs are included in the diet of hedgehogs, blackbirds, starlings, ground beetles, frogs, lizards and toads. It is enough just to create comfortable conditions habitat, and you will forget about such misfortune as slugs. For amphibians, build a small pond, make a hedgehog a shelter of brushwood and branches in a corner of the garden, leave a bunch of leaves for ground beetles, and a pile of stones for lizards. Birds will love the nesting places on the trees and the feeding troughs in winter. Then the birds, by habit, will visit your site in the summer. Periodically feed useful tenants and they will repay you a hundredfold.
Council. If the farm has a bird, then release the living creatures into the garden in spring and autumn, not a single slug will leave their vigilant gaze, and the birds will receive a valuable protein supplement to the diet.
Everyone loves intoxicating drinks
Snails and slugs are very attracted to the smell of kvass, beer and honey. Drink traps are effective at night when gastropods are especially active. You can use cans or plastic bottles filled with treats, and even bears will slide down to the last feast. How it's done.
- Take a jar or plastic bottle with a cut-off top.
- Slightly below the neckline it is slightly smeared with honey.
- A little beer is poured into the bottom. By the way, Bavarian gardeners claim that slugs are still gourmets and prefer dark beers.
- The container is dug into the ground level with the soil.
- A piece of slate or curved cardboard is placed on top.
- A trap with a bowl-like lid can be purchased at the garden center. It works on the same principle as a bank, only it looks more beautiful.
Use snail traps
Mollusks themselves will come to such a treat, you just need to periodically top up the bait. It should be noted that this method does not show in all regions high efficiency, so look according to the setting.
Physical methods of destruction
The simplest method is manual collection, although very time consuming. Best time for "catch" - early morning or evening, as well as immediately after the rain, when snails crawl out en masse. Slightly simplify the task of the piles laid out on the site freshly cut grass, boards, pieces of linoleum, under them mollusks are hiding from scorching sun, and at night they crawl out to fish in search of food.
Another method of destruction is by spraying plants on which slugs are seen with hot water.
Some gardeners sprinkle the soil in the beds with salt, supposedly salt has a detrimental effect on the pest, but it should be remembered that soil salinity negatively affects the growth of plants, so you should not get carried away in this way.
They do not like slugs and soil sprayed with iron or copper sulfate. Powdered with lime or chemical fertilizers. Lime absorbs mucus from the surface of the mollusks, they die from dehydration.
Plant snail-repellent grasses in the area
The industry offers metaldehyde-based products. These are the well-known Thunderstorm and Thunder. Preparations are granules of blue color, which are scattered along the landings in a strip. The substance infects the digestive tract of the pest, it is safe for humans and soil microorganisms, as well as birds. However, it is recommended to use it with caution, it is still a pesticide.
Council. Gastropods prefer shaded areas with sufficient moisture, therefore regular mowing of the side of the plot and the turf garden is recommended.
Spices
In nature, mollusks play a positive role: they eat fallen litter, plant shoots, and mushrooms. However, their mass march through the gardens is like a locust infestation, and then there is no need to think about the benefits of snails. But not all greens are eagerly eaten by snails and slugs. Here are the observations of gardeners:
- Molluscs do not particularly like nettles, so the dried grass is used for mulching vegetable plantings. They do not really like the beds covered with pine needles.
- It is noticed that the smell of aromatic herbs repels the pest: lavender, rosemary and sage, laurel, santolin, parsley. Many people combine planting these herbs with vegetable beds.
- Effective sprinkling around plantings with hot ground pepper. But after the rain, the powder needs to be renewed.
- Mustard decoctions and garlic tinctures make the plants sprayed with this potion unattractive to slugs.
Council. As a distraction, scatter your favorite slug greens over the beds: lettuce, beet tops, tomato. The snails will first of all take this treat and will not crawl to the main crop in the garden. Replace the foliage periodically with fresh ones. This bait works especially well in the greenhouse.
Mechanical barriers to pests
Various tricks used to combat a gluttonous pest significantly limit the freedom of movement of the pest:
- the industry offers plastic gutters for edged ridges. The device is attached to the fence and filled with water. Enemies cannot overcome such a ditch and often drown in it. For single plants, plastic rings are produced;
Do not use too many chemicals so as not to disrupt the ecosystem of the vegetable garden
- fine gravel, crushed eggshells and broken seashells do not cause slugs positive emotionstherefore, such materials work well between rows, but only in dry weather;
- coarse sand is used for sprinkling beds with young shoots;
- craftsmen line the borders of the beds with wire connected to a battery. Trying to crawl over the obstacle, the pest closes the circuit and receives a small electric shock. Not fatal, but rather unpleasant to try again.
It is impossible to completely clear your possession of snails and slugs. If only because new individuals will creep up to you from neighboring areas. But their numbers can be contained. If there is no time to mess around with folk remedies, then apply chemicals... In any case, there is always a way out, because it is very difficult to put up with a spoiled crop and eaten seedlings.
How to deal with slugs and snails: video
Fighting snails and slugs: photos
In the article, we will consider how to deal with snails in gardens, because they are not only the most common pests, but also carriers of helminths, the latter subsequently affecting people and pets.
The grape snail has a secluded living area, which is located in a humid and shaded place from the sun, so you will not find shellfish in the garden on a sunny day.
They appear on the beds in rainy weather and begin to eat juicy leaves, leaving behind mucus and holes on the leaves.
How to prevent the appearance of snails?
The diet of snails contains not only fresh juicy leaves. Molluscs still feed on dead plants, and therefore bring not only harm, but also benefit to gardeners.
Although most often such benefits are hardly noticeable, because scientists have counted more than 14 thousand teeth in these harmless-looking animals, with the help of which they grind everything juicy that grows in their path.
That is why people have to look for ways to destroy gluttonous individuals in the garden and in the garden.
It is difficult to deal with the invasion of such pests. To remove them, it is recommended to use mechanical, chemical and folk methods.
But most of all, those gardeners who have learned to prevent the appearance of snails in the garden and in the vegetable garden were lucky.
Most often these are cut weeds, tall grass on the borders of the vegetable garden or in the garden, heaps of stones.
Sometimes the gardener does not even suspect why it is so difficult for him to get rid of snails, but explains this factor dense planting of plants and untimely removal of the lower leaves of the seedlings, under which the mollusks hide.
It is necessary to fight pests in the garden by regularly weeding the soil, which will not allow them to hide in the cracks of the earth.
It will be possible to get rid of snails forever if you do not leave them a chance of survival in the cold season. For this purpose, it is recommended, after harvesting, to remove all plant residues from the garden in which they could hide and eat.
Although the snail is a natural orderly, it still harms the crop. Of course, you need to fight it, but taking into account the fact that everything is interconnected in nature, and each inhabitant of the fauna has its own role, and the snail is no exception.
Therefore, wanting to get rid of the shellfish, harmful harvest, you need to understand that if you completely destroy them on the site, then there will be no one to deal with the healing of the ecological system of the garden.
How to deal with shellfish in the garden?
It's hard to imagine what harm a small snail can do to a huge garden.
Well, who would suspect a defenseless creature hiding under a shell when there are rodents and insects around, which daily harm the flora.
“It is precisely from them that you need to get rid of, and not fight with some kind of snails,” - so thinks a large number of amateur gardeners.
Of course, living in wildlife, the mollusk actually feeds on the remains of plants, berries and mushrooms found.
But individuals living in a cultivated garden do not bother looking for food, and this is what harm the plantings.
Snails carry great harm with the arrival of spring, when young shoots appear in the garden. The most interesting thing is that from the garden they move to the cellar for the winter, where they are stored in fresh vegetables and fruits.
This is where the patience of the owners of the site comes to an end, and they begin to look for all sorts of ways to get rid of harmful shellfish.
And yet, despite the harm and trouble that snails bring to gardeners, environmentalists argue that the fight against them should be soft.
For example, good way involves catching snails with your hands: animals are slow and at the same time more noticeable than other pests, which allows them to be quickly removed from shrubs.
Not only can you get rid of snails, you can lure them with the help of a sweet compote, which will definitely work, because they have a very keen sense of smell.
For this purpose, a wide vessel with a low rim should be placed under fruit plantations.
You will have to wait a long time, because the mollusks are very slow, but when they slide, they can be easily collected.
The fight against snails in the garden can also be biological, because birds, hedgehogs, frogs and lizards will want to eat them.
A hedgehog will help get rid of the invasion of mollusks, which can be attracted by leaving a saucer of milk on your site overnight.
It is possible that in next time the hedgehog will bring his family to the treat. It is worth noting that one hedgehog can eat as many snails as it weighs itself.
To get rid of snails with frogs, you need to leave dishes with water in several corners of the garden.
At night, when the frogs, feeling the moisture, come to drink, they will certainly feast on snails.
Chemical control should be applied when too many pests have proliferated.
Snail Control Chemicals
Some help to get rid of snails in the garden and in the garden chemical substances, but it must be remembered that their components are harmful not only to mollusks, but also dangerous to the human body.
An example is Metaldehyde. The product is produced in granules and tablets. With its help, young shoots are saved from the invasion of snails. in early spring.
The substance is considered poisonous, so people have to wash vegetables thoroughly after using it in the garden.
Otherwise, poisoning of the body threatens to damage the digestive tract, brain, renal and hepatic systems.
In this case it comes about a molluscicide. Its granules contain about 5% metaldehyde, which excludes severe poisoning.
But you still need to be careful with its use. If used for baiting molluscs liquid preparation or flammable tablets, then the concentration of the poison in them is much higher, which threatens a person with severe poisoning with a fatal outcome.
Snails do not tolerate superphosphate and lime. If these preparations are scattered in strips with an interval of 15 cm, then in this way the movement of snails into the garden can be stopped.
But similar method suitable only until the rain passes.
Negatively affects nervous system snails coffee solution. Its use allows you to destroy small individuals and drive adult mollusks into a stupor.
The coffee solution is sprinkled on plant leaves or over the soil. One way to prepare a coffee solution is to use 10 g of instant coffee and 200 ml of water.
Copper means help to control the movement of snails in the garden or garden. They are self-adhesive tapes and headbands, they can have a different shape.
On contact with such a product, the mollusks experience an electric shock, as a result of which they cannot overcome the obstacle.
On this moment there are bezels that run on battery power, but give a similar result to copper devices.
If there are very few snails, then you can use a special tincture, which is made on the basis of garlic. By sprinkling the plant with them, it will be possible to scare off pests from plantings.
Traditional methods of dealing with snails in the garden
There are also less costly methods that help remove snails in the garden and in the garden.
If you wish, you can try to get rid of snails with folk remedies, for example, erect an insurmountable obstacle in the form of strips of eggshells in front of the mollusks.
Instead of eggshells, you can use crushed shells, sawdust and other materials with a porous and prickly structure that are unpleasant for the body of snails.
They are scattered in strips between plants, but it should be noted that such an obstacle is temporary - it loses its effectiveness under raindrops.
Do not forget about the option, which boils down to the manual collection of snails that harm the vegetable garden and garden.
For the same reason, fruits, herbs and vegetables should always be washed before eating. It is necessary to manually collect pests every evening or immediately after rain, in cloudy weather, when they go hunting. After which they are destroyed or taken away from their homes.
Some gardeners have learned to keep snails at a safe distance for young shoots by scattering the leaves of other plants around the beds. But in this case, you have to constantly replace the fallen tops with fresh ones.
In order to reduce the number of pests, manual collection is recommended. Snails don't like alkaline materials - to ward off shellfish, you can periodically sprinkle baking soda or wood ash on your garden, vegetable garden or plants.
A very ancient method of getting rid of snails is a trap: a pot is dug into the soil so that its top is level with the ground.
Then it is filled with sweet water or compote, and so that rain and leaves do not fall into the container with liquid, a canopy is erected over it.
It is necessary to collect pests and change the bait every morning, preferably as soon as the sun appears in the sky.
In conclusion, it should be mentioned that snails are not able to swim, and therefore the chances of protecting small beds from their invasion increase by creating water barriers from the gutters.
Did you know that harmless-looking, inconspicuous snails have 14175 teeth, with which they grind everything edible in the garden and vegetable garden that comes their way?
It is quite difficult to fight the invasion of snails, the easiest way is to prevent it by periodically conducting prophylaxis against these voracious mollusks.
Fighting snails in the garden, in the garden and in the country is carried out different methods: ecological, mechanical, chemical and folk remedies.
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Fighting snails in the garden
Although snails cause irreparable harm to the garden, they still belong to the category of garden orderlies. Recycling damaged by any pests, or dead residues different plants they perform an important function in the garden - they cleanse and heal the garden's ecosystem. Therefore, the fight against snails in the garden should be done soft measures, and not their complete extermination.
First of all, you should limit the access of molluscs to plants, and chemical method extermination of snails should be used only as a last resort, and only pointwise, in those places where too many snails have bred.
Good gardening is the first preventive measure against the invasion of snails. It consists of different techniques, which include improving the structure and quality of the soil, timely carried out garden workcorrectly selected garden plants, periodic maintenance of garden hygiene, crop rotation, well-chosen neighborhood of plants and much more.
All these measures will strengthen the plants, and, as you know, strong, healthy plants resist disease and pest infestation better than weakened and sick ones.
Birds, frogs, lizards, fireflies, toads, hedgehogs, some beetles also help fight snails on garden plot... Therefore, involve these beneficial fauna to provide natural pest control.
To attract them is quite simple: when you see a hedgehog in the garden, treat him with milk, then he will again come for a treat, and even bring his family. Know that one hedgehog eats snails as much as it weighs.
To lure frogs and toads, dig a small pond in your area. Catch these animals in a city pond or park, and settle them on your site, creating comfortable conditions for them.
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Fighting snails in the garden
Eating foliage, gnawing root crops and eating snail flowers, cause irreparable harm to the garden - they limit photosynthesis, reduce the appearance of ovaries, and reduce the shelf life of a damaged crop.
A damaged plant is more likely to get sick with fungal diseases, in addition, fruits rot from the mucus of the pests. There are many ways to deal with snails in the garden, but it is best to use mechanical and ecological control methods.
Chemical method used only as a last resort, since it is dangerous not only for pests, but also for plants. Mechanical method the fight against gluttonous pests is to collect them manually, which is best done with tweezers.
We catch snails
You can catch shellfish using traps that are placed in cool, humid places. To do this, rags, old bags moistened with fruit juice or beer, cabbage or burdock leaves, boards are placed between the beds on the paths.
On a hot day, the snails will crawl under the laid out shelters, you just have to quickly collect them in the evening. You can also fight snails in the country with the help of shallow containers filled with water and covered with rags. The containers need to be dug in level with the ground. The collected snails are destroyed in saline or soap solution.
Grape snails
Most often, grape snails live in the garden and in the garden. They have a soft body, so the fight against grape snails can be produced using eggshells, broken shells, fine gravel.
By scattering crushed shells and shells of eggs in ribbons between the beds, you will create an unpleasant surface for the movement of snails, because the sharp edges of the scattered material will cut their delicate body.
You can also put 2-3 strips of superphosphate or lime between the beds - they quickly absorb moisture and mucus from the surface of the snail's body, thereby blocking its movement. But this method of struggle has a drawback - it is inconvenient to water the plants, and it is washed off by the first rain.
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Snail control products
As mentioned above, the fight against snails in a summer cottage should, if possible, be carried out by mechanical or folk remedies. You can place plastic gutters filled with water in the garden or in the garden.
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Environmental Ways
In the garden, gutters with water are attached to prefabricated beds. Water for snails is an insurmountable obstacle, so once they get into the water, they can no longer get out of it.
Ecological way pest control consists in attracting representatives of useful fauna: starlings, jays, thrushes, hedgehogs, frogs, etc.
Not all plants are eaten by snails - spices they can't stand it. Therefore, plant garlic, parsley, rosemary, sage, laurel around the perimeter of the beds - they will scare away gluttonous pests from plants.
As a means of fighting snails, you can use infusions of coffee, mustard and bitter pepper. 2 tsp coffee powder, mustard or bitter pepper are diluted in 200 gr. boiling water, cool and spray the plants.
They do not like snails, and fresh nettles, laid on the beds. You can also buy plastic wide headbands with folded edges.
They are fixed around the plants in the ground and that's it - snails will not be able to get close to greenery. You can also distract snails from the plants by using old leaves and plant tops.
This pest control method is especially effective in greenhouses and greenhouses. Carried away by devouring this waste, snails “forget” about growing plants, so they can be safely collected together with drying waste and destroyed. Traps should be replaced periodically with fresh tops.
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Modern and chemical products
The methods of fighting snails are being improved all the time. There are, for example, headbands and self-adhesive tapes made of copper, a covering material that has a copper coating - with their help you can carry out electrical pest control. From contact with copper, molluscs receive a mild electrical shock, which makes them unwilling to cross this obstacle.
It is quite easy to use this method in action: the purchased microorganisms are diluted with water and watered from the watering can of the planting where the snails live. All snails die in this place within a week. One watering is enough for a month and a half of action.
You can also fight snails in the garden and in the garden with chemical agents, if nothing else helps. Chemicals for pest control are different, but the more effective are metaldehyde granules "Meta" and "Thunderstorm".
The beautiful blue granules of these drugs attract and instantly kill shellfish, but you should be aware that it is also dangerous for pets and people. Therefore, precautions should be taken when using these drugs.
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Fighting snails with folk remedies
Fighting snails with folk remedies is carried out in various proven ways.
Salt treatment
The most common way to deal with these pests is to sprinkle the ground with salt or spray the plants with saline, but this can cause the leaves to dry out or discolor in some plants.
Some gardeners and gardeners water the plants with a solution from a watering can citric acid or vinegar. The solution should be made weak - 25 gr. citric acid or 25 ml of vinegar 9% per 10 liters of water. Plants are sprayed with these solutions once a week, preferably in the evening.
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In the garden
To effectively fight snails in the garden, even such popular measureslike a set of low cans of lemonade, fermented compote or beer.
Banks are dug in level with the ground in places where snails accumulate. Mollusks, attracted by the smell, are stuffed into jars overnight, and they cannot get back out. A good effect is given by ash scattered around the plants or dry coarse sand.
In greenhouses and hotbeds folk remedies it is recommended to spray the soil with garlic infusion: 50 gr. garlic is ground in a meat grinder and infused in 10 liters of water. Then they mix, filter and water the passage between the beds and the beds themselves.
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On strawberries
You can fight snails on strawberries like this: sprinkle the ground with spruce needles or put a thick layer of pine and spruce paws on the garden bed. Spruce and pine needles provide good protection against snails, and in addition protect the soil from drying out and fertilize it.
The collected snails are placed in a salt solution, washing powder or kerosene. Do not place live snails in compost heaps - in favorable conditions they will start laying eggs.
Dig up the ground in the spring, thereby destroying the clutches of eggs laid by snails. 1-2 times a month it is necessary to loosen the soil, weed out and remove them from the garden.
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Few people know that our children's favorites - snails - have 14,175 teeth! Only the shark has more. And why would such a cute and shell-protected mollusk have so many teeth? Yes, to grind all the "green" that gets in her way. In addition, snails not only cause great damage to our gardens, but also are carriers of worms and tapeworms. How gardeners are fighting the invasion of these little gluttons different countries? We learned about this by wandering the world wide web of the Internet.
Let's start the review with the most humane methods of dealing with snails and slugs:
1. Avoid thickened plantings and weeds in your area. Timely mow the grass along the sides of the site and do not scatter various rubbish, bricks, boards ... - among all this "good" snails and slugs feel very comfortable. Better between rows vegetable crops spread out wet rags, bags, boards, plywood, cabbage leaves - slugs like to crawl into such shelters for a day and it will be easier to collect them here.
2. Near fruit and berry crops, it is useful to plant garlic, lavender, thyme, rosemary, mustard and some other plants that are not to the taste of snails. Beds with strawberries, tomatoes can be planted with parsley - it will scare away snails.
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3. Dumpsters and compost heaps, which are abundant in rotting debris that attract snails, can be sprinkled with coarse salt. This should be done in the evening, in dry weather, when the snails crawl out to graze. In the morning, on the compost heap, you will find a placer of dead snails, since they strongly dislike everything related to salt. Just do not overuse salt in the flower beds and vegetable beds, as few and what plants tolerate strong soil salinity.
4. Attract birds, toads, frogs, ground beetles, hedgehogs to your site. Seeing a hedgehog at the dacha, treat him with milk, and then feed him daily, prepare a shelter for him, for example, in the form of a heap of brushwood in a secluded corner of the garden. And then slugs and snails will become rare for you, because they are a favorite treat of hedgehogs.
5. To lure toads and frogs, you can dig a small pond, pile up a bunch of last year's foliage nearby. These animals now often settle in city parks and ponds, so you can catch several of them and create comfortable conditions for them in your country house. Toads can be fed with milk, fed with pieces of cookies, bread.
6. Non-toxic and cheap way the fight against snails and slugs was suggested by an American woman: “Every spring, I take care of orphaned ducklings and injured ducks. Their keen eyes and empty stomachs never miss an opportunity to profit from a slug or snail. But in places of the garden where ducks are unwanted guests, there I use crushed river shells with sharp edges, which I scatter with ribbons between the beds. A bag of crushed shells lasts several years. "
7. The action of the special ecological granular material Slug Stoppa Granules, which is scattered around the plants, is also based on the barrier principle and it acts during the season. Granules create a physical barrier for slugs and snails: they absorb moisture and mucus, dry out the surface of their bodies, making it impossible for pests to move.
8. Physical barriers include special plastic gutters that are attached to the perimeter of the ridges. These gutters are filled with water, which serves as a mechanical barrier for slugs. There are also wide, folded-edge plastic bands available on the market that anchor in the ground around the plants to keep snails and slugs out of the plant.
9. Any dry, porous materials, as well as fine gravel, crushed shells and eggshells, are unpleasant surfaces for slugs and snails, therefore they are well suited as filler between rows. However, it should be borne in mind that in rainy weather, their effectiveness decreases significantly.
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10. Stripes of coarse sand, crushed eggshells or nutshells create peculiar thorny barriers that are insurmountable for snails and slugs. This protection option is quite suitable for seedlings of vegetables and young flower crops... And each copy large plants (delphinium, hosts, peony ...) can be protected by surrounding it with a mini coarse sand ridge.
11. To protect strawberries from snails, sprinkle the ground with spruce needles or put a thick layer of spruce and pine legs on the surface of the beds; the needles crumble by themselves and serve as protection from snails, in addition, they protect the soil from rapid drying and, finally, having rotted, are useful as fertilizer. The skeleton of the legs serves at the same time as a support for the berries and protects them from contact with the ground.
12. Dried nettle plants can be laid out under tomato, pepper or eggplant plants, to which slugs are great lovers. Slugs are afraid of them, and if there are enough nettles, they will prefer to bypass this place.
13. Mulching the ground near the plants with sawdust good remedy to fight snails and slugs. Sawdust sticks well to slippery shellfish and they become like bread and stop moving.
14. Plant vegetables in raised ridges or tubs, tie legumes, tomatoes and pumpkin seeds to supports in time, use clear plastic caps (such as the lower halves of large plastic water bottles) and foil cover for young vulnerable plants - all this does welcome plants physically less accessible to slugs.
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15. Method mechanical protection... With the help of special plastic funnel-shaped restraints, you can very effectively protect your plantings from snails and slugs. The funnel is installed around the young plant and protects its roots and shoots. In addition, this funnel will provide precise access of water to the plant roots when watering.
16. A sheet of plywood (15x15 cm) can be attached to a stick with a large nut screwed onto it. Put on this nut big leaf plywood (18x18 cm). Push a wet burdock leaf or a wet rag into the gap between them. It will crawl there overnight a large number of snails. Destroy pests in the morning.
17. Snails do not like tar-smeared places. Shrubs can be protected from them by making a ring of cotton wool at the sole of the trunk, an inch wide, and coated with tar or sticky resin.
18. The simplest method - "manual collection" - is very effective, but requires almost daily work. Collect snails in the evening or after rain, and then destroy them (for example, in a strong saline solution or boiling water) or take them somewhere away from gardens and cultural plantings (this option is more humane, but also more time consuming).
19. Snails and slugs lay their eggs in the ground (somewhere under cover, bush, thick grass, etc.). And when digging the soil, you need to carefully look if there are clutches of snails. If there is, then they must be destroyed - crushed or buried deep.
20. Method "drunken trap". A surprisingly easy way is to place the beer containers near the plants. Snails and slugs, it turns out, respect the foamy drink no less than ours. They creep into a tempting smell, and when they get into a container with beer, they drown there. The main thing here is to set a sufficiently deep container, and the beer should not be poured to the brim. For example, take a plastic water bottle, flatten one side to keep it flat and not roll, and pour beer (preferably dark) into it. The slugs, attracted by the smell of beer, crawl into the bottle and die there. This method is also used in a special snail trap.
21. Special traps for slugs and snails are a bowl covered with an umbrella-roof. The trap is installed so that the entrances 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 prevents rainwater and debris from entering. In the absence of such a trap, pour the bait into simple bowls from an old unnecessary service and dig in flush with the soil surface on ridges and borders with the most favorite plants of snails. Check and empty traps regularly in the morning.
22. As traps for snails, ordinary clippings of boards, pieces of slate or roofing material, wet rags and burlap, linoleum, watermelon peels, cabbage leaves, etc. are quite suitable - slugs like to crawl into such shelters for a day.
23. American gardeners recommend highly original way catching slugs with grapefruit: just take half a grapefruit peel, cut a small hole in it and set this domed trap. Mollusks attracted by the smell will gather under the skin overnight, and in the morning it will only be necessary to collect and eliminate them.
24. A regular cup of coffee can also repel pests and not harm plants. Caffeine, in the form of an aqueous solution, applied to the soil or to the leaves of plants, repels and kills slugs and snails, presumably by destroying their nervous system. According to the observations of American scientists, a 1 or 2 percent solution kills even large individuals (although it discolors the leaves of some plants), and a 0.1 percent solution introduces pests into confusion, accelerating the heartbeat, and scares them away from plantations. To obtain a 0.1% caffeine solution, you can, for example, dissolve a double dose of instant coffee in a cup of water. Coffee grounds can also be used as a snail repellant, but spraying with caffeine solution is much more effective: the slugs crawl away, barely coming into contact with caffeinated soil. Caffeine can kill small snails and slugs and scare large ones away from your garden. It is best to use caffeine for small gardens and lots. Unfortunately, it can act not only on snails and slugs, but also on beneficial insects.
25. There are plants that slugs and snails do not like and try to avoid, and this is primarily garlic, as well as many (but far from all!) Aromatic plants (lavender, sage, santolina, thyme, rosemary, laurel, etc.) ... Garlic is used by manufacturers of special phyto-infusions that repel slugs. Infusions of garlic, bitter pepper, and mustard are famous folk remedies for fighting slugs and snails. At home, 100 g of grated garlic is infused for a day in a small volume of water, the resulting solution is diluted several times and sprayed with plants.
26. The way of domestic gardeners: dissolve 50 g of dry mustard in 300 ml of water, let it brew for an hour, dilute another 3-4 times and spray the plants.
28. Destroy snails by dropping them into a bucket with a strong solution of salt or lime. You can pollinate areas inhabited by snails with powdered superphosphate (300-400 g), slaked lime (300 g) or a mixture of lime with tobacco dust in a ratio of 1: 1 (200-250 g per 10 square meters).
29. Means of electrical control. In garden centers, self-adhesive tapes, headbands or copper-clad coverings (trade name Shocka) are available for purchase. Contact with copper gives the molluscs a small electrical shock, so they do not cross such a copper barrier. Recently, headbands with a small battery have appeared, which also give snails and slugs a small electric shock when crossing an obstacle.
Methods of "chemical attack" suggest using the achievements of the chemical industry.
30. Metaldehyde (sold in Russia under trade marks Thunderstorm and Meta). Apply no later than 20 days before harvest, at the rate of 40 g of granules per 10 sq. m (see instructions on the package). It is not necessary to pour these granules in piles - it is more efficient to lay them out at a distance of 10-15 cm from each other. Manufacturers assure that when correct use the product is completely harmless to people, pets and environmenthowever, caveats are common in the horticultural press. Metaldehyde should be stored and handled with great care. Wash vegetables and herbs especially thoroughly if you have used metaldehyde in your garden.
31. Finely crushed iron vitriol, mixed with sand or lime, is sprinkled on the earth in the evening or in wet weather. Neither snails nor slugs will pass where it is poured inkstone, since they die from touching this substance.
32. Abroad, they do the following: they cover the flower beds with thin shit, on which powder is poured copper sulfate, or stretch ropes soaked in a solution of copper sulfate around the flower beds.
33. Spraying plants with copper-containing agents (Hom, Oxykh, etc.), which are not washed off by rain for a long time. Snails do not die from it, but plants covered with blue copper stains become unattractive to snails.
34. Very effective remedy for bison snail control. Valid until three months and is not washed off by the rain.
35. You can pollinate the aisles with slaked fluff lime or superphosphate (200–300 g per 10 sq. M), sprinkle slaked lime around the greenhouses. Lime is sprinkled on the soil in two steps, with a break of 10-15 minutes. At the first sprinkling, the snail is protected from lime by secreting mucus from itself, while at the second sprinkling, the snail is no longer able to secrete mucus, it turns black and dies. By sprinkling lime on the soil for two days in a row, you can finally destroy all the snails.
Almost any person is ready to admire a small and cute creature that quickly hides in the original shell when he feels danger. Antennae, eyes, soft body - all this causes interest, and especially in children who are ready to play with snails for a long time. But only one or two individuals found on the territory of the dacha is a normal situation. If there are much more of them, you need to start looking for ways to deal with mollusks, because they are the most real pests.
Especially for each reader of the site, we have done a serious job and found 10 better waysthat will help you quickly get rid of pests in the country.
Children against snails
Quite an interesting and extraordinary way, but it is the children who can collect almost all the snails in the country, give them only this opportunity. They will carefully search every garden bed and even lonely plants, collecting each new specimen in a jar or bucket. Naturally, it is better not to tell your kids that they are a serious strategic weapon against a summer cottage pest, well, or not to destroy pests with them, because this can injure the child's psyche. True, this can be avoided altogether, and after collection, simply take them to the nearest forest belt. These are not cats that find their way home, and therefore, after manual collection and removal, the snails will no longer return to their summer cottage!
Animals against shellfish
Here everything is a little different, because some animals will look for snails on the site not only for fun, but also for their own food. As in the case of slugs, the fight against which we described on the site not so long ago, hedgehogs and frogs can be used against mollusks, which eat pests of green beds.
You can use as a tool and poultryor rather, ducks, which are very voracious. They easily swallow every snail that comes their way and quickly cleanse the dacha of them. But one should not forget that ducks are not very smart birds, and therefore they will not bypass cultivated plants. Ducks, along with helping us, can do harm, for example, trample seedlings or pluck them for their own food. In addition, they are bound to leave a serious trail in the form of droppings. Find out to get good harvest cucumbers.
Therefore, it is worth releasing ducks in a palisade or vegetable garden only if you do not grow anything special there.
Salt killing snails
According to observations experienced summer residents it is known that these mollusks do not like salt, and not only do not like it, they also cannot survive salt exposure. This is what you should take advantage of.
In places where snails were collected, where you saw their maximum concentration, pests will go out to feed in the evening or at night, which means that it is there that you need to sprinkle everything abundantly with salt.
If it's a pile of leaves in the garden, overheating weeds in the corner suburban area or even compost heap, this method can be used. If you notice a congestion of snails in a garden bed where cultivated plants grow, it is undesirable to use salt, because it can destroy the plants and damage the soil.
Fighting snails on strawberries
Cute-looking mollusks often spoil our strawberry harvest, and since they feed at night, and during the day they try to wait out the danger in shelters, then we need to deal with them with more thoughtful means. It can even be plants that will become the permanent protection of the strawberry. Back in early spring when you're just starting out spring care behind the plot, plant mustard, rosemary, thyme, or even parsley around the strawberry garden. You can find out for a "healthy" garden.
This will create a certain barrier through which the snails will not go!
Even if you notice uninvited guests on the strawberries, they can be quickly collected and carried away from the cottage, these were 100% random mischief-makers.
We use sawdust, ash, sand and granules
You can fight snails even more in simple ways, the same as with slugs. These pests are very similar to each other, and therefore the measures of influence on them can be identical.
When crawling along a garden bed, plant or any object, the snail secretes mucus, with the help of which a simpler movement is created. If you dry out the pest's body or reduce the secreted mucus as much as possible, this movement will become impossible, and the mollusk simply will not go further, well, or it will not be able to move at all.
You can create such barriers with dry materials. It can be special purchased granules that can be found in specialized stores or on the market, well, or improvised materials - sand, wood ash, small sawdust. You need to make strips, necessarily closed around the perimeter of the beds, only 10-15 cm wide by choosing comfortable material... A snail, crossing the "border", will not crawl even half of the "obstacle course", which means it will not get to your greenery.
Sharp materials in the fight against snails
Snails are afraid to dry out their bodies, but injuring them for pests is generally very scary. Therefore, having felt a barrier of sharp materials in front of them, the pests stop and go in the other direction, even if there is a lot of tasty and juicy food ahead.
As a similar barrier, you can use a nut or eggshellwhich is smashed to create sharp cuts and chips, as well as broken gravel. Glass could also be used, but it is very difficult to remove it from the garden and not get hurt, and therefore this method we do not recommend.
Another material that you can try to create a similar barrier is old PVC panels for interior decoration premises. In the sun, they harden and burst, creating sharp chips that are dangerous to molluscs. You can crumble the plastic smaller and create a border with it.
Funnels in the fight against snails
Special plastic funnels have been on sale for a long time, which protect young plants from being eaten by snails. These are small plastic products made of thin material, which represents the protection placed in the soil. When the funnel is installed, the pest simply does not have the ability to crawl over it, as it interferes sharp corner... The snail also cannot pass under the funnel, because it digs into the soil for several centimeters.
Scaring off snails with mustard
They say that molluscs cannot stand mustard and do not even crawl near this plant. This was played by gardeners, who decided to try an even more radical way to scare away snails than to plant mustard around the beds. The recipe is very simple - insist 40-50 g of dry mustard in 250-300 ml of water, and after an hour, spray those plants in the garden that are most often attacked by snails.
The scent of mustard will scare off snails that will start to go to other beds, which means that you should immediately take care of their protection. You can also use mustard in terms of prevention, so that pests do not approach young plants at all.
How to use coffee against snails
It is worth talking about coffee very seriously, as it is not just a way that can destroy shellfish, but also a means of exterminating beneficial insects. cultivated plants... If you do not want to lose everything in the garden, then it is worth working with coffee very carefully.
No, we cannot say that coffee grounds or caffeine solution are that dangerous, but they have a certain effect on young shoots and leaves, as well as the vital activity of insects that are useful in the garden. Therefore, if you are already desperate in the fight against snails, you can easily try using coffee, but if not, find another way.
So how do you use coffee? You can take the brewed grounds, naturally used, and use it to create a barrier around the plants that you worry about the most. The difficulty is that coffee grounds are effective for only a few days, and drinking enough coffee to constantly renew the "fences" around the plants is harmful. Then you can use a caffeine solution made from tablets or instant coffee. Here it is necessary to seriously reduce the concentration so as not to harm plants and insects, to about 0.1%. Next, take this solution and spray it. The very next day, the snails will not go to feed on the treated plants.
You can talk for a long time about how to destroy, drive out, kill or scare away snails so that they no longer spoil our garden and, naturally, the nervous system. But we decided to advise you on comprehensive measures of influence, which, according to our personal survey among summer residents, took first place. Everything is very simple here, you only need a little time and desire to deal with pests in the garden and vegetable garden!
DIY snail trap (video)
If you follow these instructions, you can pretty well save the beds from the "raids" of snails, and therefore we recommend that you add this page to your bookmarks and if necessary advise friends and acquaintances:
- Even when planting plants, from spring, lay pieces of plywood or boards in the corners of the beds, which will create a refuge for the snails. Help the molluscs find their place under them, for example, by placing stops under the plywood so that a kind of void is created below. Then, after sprouting, check your traps every week and get snails out from under them, which will sit in place all day, and only crawl out in the evening to feed. Slugs, which are also pests of the garden, will also gather here;
- Around the same time you plant your plants in the spring, take care to protect your garden as much as possible. Plant protective plants around to keep the pest out of the green shoots. So you will save a significant part of the crop from destruction;
- Routine maintenance of garden beds and flower beds already gives you the opportunity effective fight with pests. Think about how good wood ash is for the soil, and just sprinkle it on the area. Naturally, not constantly, but periodically, thereby creating difficulties for the movement of pests and enriching the soil with useful substances;
- About once a month, carry out preventive spraying of plants with complex preparations that affect several types of pests at once.
Just a few points, and the standard biological snail protection works. If this does not help, we advise you to resort to the use of special chemicals that will help bring order to the site.
Fighting shellfish on own dacha not as difficult as at first glance. This is not a spider mite, which is difficult to remove from the greenhouse, and not even the Colorado potato beetle, which is full of potatoes every year. Snails are a serious food eater, but you can destroy it, especially if you are already prepared for this confrontation.