Slugs
The most damaging pest in our garden and I've tried most tricks to deter/kill them.
- eggshells (placing broken eggshells around the base of plants) — doesn't seem to work at all, especially around much loved fare such as seedling cabbages.
- beer traps (submerging a jar full of beer close to tempting crops — works, but the captured, dead slugs need to be disposed of daily and the beer replaced. Not a pleasant job and not cheap either.
- Salt (pouring salt or salt water over the critters) — again works but unpleasant, mean and not good for the soil.
So what really works:
After dark slug hunting. Get a head lamp; a bucket of soapy water and a pair of gloves (or better something to pick them up with that won't leave your gloves all slimy) and then literally patrol the garden, picking and dropping every slug into the water. I'm lucky regarding disposal as I can pour the bucket of dregs over the wall into the abandoned, overgrown building site next door.
Night one I must have collected around 200 slugs. Night two maybe 120 and by night three the population roaming the garden was down to about 30. The only issue being that the patrols have to be kept up at least every other night.
Grape Leafhoppers
They are on everything: grapevine, rosemary, thyme, mint. Last year they sucked my rosemary white. This year the stronger plants seem more immune (2016 fingers crossed). The only thing I find effective is blasting the plants with water at night so that the flies come loose and I assume some die. Apart from slugs and snails they are the main curse in my garden.
Chafer larvae
Digging them out seems the only really way to manage them. If a plant seems unhealthy for no apparent reason these grubs may be sucking on its roots. In one tiny bed in our first summer (2014) we found 5 of these larvae. I found a few since in the vegetable bed. They attack lawns too apparently but heaven knows how you are supposed to identify the problem and find the grubs.
Stink beetles
The pretty green diamond shaped beetles suck the colour out of tomatoes in particular. They inject an enzyme into the tomato in order to feed and this makes the fruit discoloured and soft at the point of puncture. Not an issue in terms of still eating the fruit (apparently) but if the stink bug runs havoc and pricks your tomatoes multiple times they don't look pretty and it's frankly rather off-putting to imagine another creature's juices inside your dinner.
Grape Leafhoppers
They are on everything: grapevine, rosemary, thyme, mint. Last year they sucked my rosemary white. This year the stronger plants seem more immune (2016 fingers crossed). The only thing I find effective is blasting the plants with water at night so that the flies come loose and I assume some die. Apart from slugs and snails they are the main curse in my garden.
Chafer larvae
Digging them out seems the only really way to manage them. If a plant seems unhealthy for no apparent reason these grubs may be sucking on its roots. In one tiny bed in our first summer (2014) we found 5 of these larvae. I found a few since in the vegetable bed. They attack lawns too apparently but heaven knows how you are supposed to identify the problem and find the grubs.
Stink beetles
The pretty green diamond shaped beetles suck the colour out of tomatoes in particular. They inject an enzyme into the tomato in order to feed and this makes the fruit discoloured and soft at the point of puncture. Not an issue in terms of still eating the fruit (apparently) but if the stink bug runs havoc and pricks your tomatoes multiple times they don't look pretty and it's frankly rather off-putting to imagine another creature's juices inside your dinner.
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