After having seen numerous amounts of slug in my garden, particularly loitering about my bush bean leaves I've become somewhat temporarily obsessed with them, and I don't mean a good obsession, I mean to kill as many of them as possible. I know that I cannot get rid of them and they will probably always be a pester to me but I must find a way to thwart them from their evil plans of garden domination. In order to do this I must know them better, so I wiki'ed it up and found some pretty interesting information definitely worth sharing.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia: Slug
- Slug is a common name that is normally applied to any gastropod mollusc that lacks a shell, that has a very reduced shell, or has a small internal shell. (This is in contrast to the common name snail, applied to gastropods that have a coiled shell large enough that the soft parts of the animal can retract fully into it.)
- The soft, slimy bodies of slugs are prone to desiccation, so land-living slugs are confined to moist environments and must retreat to damp hiding places when the weather is dry.
- Like other pulmonate land snails, most slugs have two pairs of 'feelers' or tentacles on their head. The upper pair is light sensing and has eyespots at the ends, while the lower pair provides the sense of smell. Both pairs are retractable, and can be regrown if lost.
- Some slug species hibernate underground during the winter in temperate climates, but in other species, the adults die in the autumn.
- Slugs' bodies are made up mostly of water, and without a full-sized shell, their soft tissues are prone to desiccation. They must generate protective mucus to survive. Many species are most active just after rain because of the moist ground. In drier conditions, they hide in damp places such as under tree bark, fallen logs, rocks, and man-made structures, such as planters, to help retain body moisture.
- The mucus secreted by the foot contains fibres which help prevent the slug from slipping down vertical surfaces.
- Slugs are hermaphrodites, having both female and male reproductive organs.
- Once a slug has located a mate, they encircle each other and sperm is exchanged through their protruded genitalia. A few days later the slugs lay around 30 eggs in a hole in the ground, or beneath the cover of an object such as a fallen log.
- Many slug species play an important ecosystem role by eating dead leaves, fungus, and decaying vegetable material. Other species eat parts of living plants.
- Some slugs are predators and eat other slugs and snails, or earthworms.
- Some slugs can self-amputate (autotomy) a portion of their tail to help the slug escape from a predator.
- The great majority of slug species are harmless to humans and to their interests, but a small number of species are serious pests of agriculture and horticulture. They can destroy foliage faster than plants can grow, thus killing even fairly large plants. They also feed on fruits and vegetables prior to harvest, making holes in the crop, which can make individual items unsuitable to sell for aesthetic reasons, and which can make the crop more vulnerable to rot and disease.
- As control measures, baits are the norm in both agriculture and the garden. In recent years iron phosphate baits have emerged and are preferred over the toxicmetaldehyde, especially because domestic or wild animals may be exposed to the bait. The environmentally safer iron phosphate has been shown to be at least as effective as poisonous baits. Methiocarb baits are no longer widely used.
- Beneficial nematodes (Phasmarhabditis hermaphrodita) are a commercially available biological control method that are effective against a wide range of common slug species. The nematodes are applied in water and actively seek out slugs in the soil and infect them, leading to the death of the slug. This control method is suitable for use in organic growing systems.
- Other slug control methods are generally ineffective, but can be somewhat useful in small gardens. These include beer traps, diatomaceous earth, crushed eggshells, coffee grounds, and copper.
- It is of scientific interest that salt kills slugs by causing water to leave its body owing to osmosis
- but this is not used for agricultural control as soil salinity is detrimental to crops.
SUGGESTED METHOD FOR TERMINATION:
Sprinkling coffee ground around the soil of leafy green plants, especially around seedlings
*Read the complete article on Wikipedia, Slugs
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