Snails/slugs/vermin

I now have my first batch of what I would regard as valuable rose seedlings, in their first week of life.

I must try and grow these ALL into plants, however recent experiences with all my op seedlings which were raised to be used as practice-run stooges, tells me I have a huge problem with snails and slugs consuming these seedlings for late dinner, overnight.

"Easy enough" you say, put out snail bait pellets in the pots.

Well...I have another problem..there is a big rat problem this season in this city of mine, apparently.

I have put out a few op seedlings with snail bait around them.....sure this solves the snail/slug issue completely, however rats are eating all the snail bait, and in the process digging out all the op rose seedlings. Of course they are also eating the rat baits, (as well as my tomatoes before they even get to develop much color).

Thank goodness I have done practice-runs with all my op seedlings (all proved absolute crap for any other use..LOL).

Help!

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Oh..I should also add...

I do have a section of the house (front veranda) which faces due east where rats never visit, probably due to street lights/openness etc..and I plan on moving these pots there with the snail bait in them. Currently they are sitting inside my kitchen by the window which has a fly screen and is kept open to encourage good air flow.
So, I already have a solution that works in my situation, but it is only pure luck..

Are there any more universal solutions to this type of problem out there?

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George,
I have a similar problem with Mice and my solution is to sow the seeds in flats inside the safety of a big box made of hardware cloth. (Here, hardware cloth is what they call welded wire mesh with 1/4" spacing between wires.) Seedlings are pricked out into 3" pots when they have at least two true leaves, at which point the Mice leave things pretty much alone. We have slugs here, by the bazillion, but I have never had a rose seedling eaten by one, for whatever reason.

Best of luck,
Paul

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One problem with my front veranda, is that humans have helped themselves to my roses, in the past. One graft I did 3 years ago had just made its first flower, when one afternoon I came back home to find someone had pinched the flower, and in the process totally dislodged the whole graft off the rootstock in the process... The veranda is at arms reach from the pedestrian way.

If its not one type of vermin here, it's another..LOL

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Paul,

In my experince thus far, the slugs only attack the very young rose seedlings (those with cotyledons and/or a few true leaves, say). Once they have many true leaves, my slugs then leave them alone.

I like your idea, it deals with all these problems, and without resorting to chemicals.

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I've long had to either build raised tables with removable lids lined with half inch hardware cloth, or raised planters covered with hardware cloth. It allows air, light and water in but vermin are prevented entry. Not perfect, but it has worked the best yet. Squirrels and rats eat the hips. Snails and slugs eat the paper tags, primarily the side with the graphite writing. A friend has suggested it is because they like 'menus'.

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Good morning (tuesday 26th Jan here, and happy "Australia Day" to the Aussies lurcking on this forum). Good afternoon (monday) in North America.

If anyone has actual photos of these hardware cloth contraptions, I would be ever so greatful for you to post them here (helps in the overall conceptualisation of the whole thing).

If you don't already have photos, don't worry, its ok!

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I used to raise silkie chickens. They ate the slugs and snails. My dog (border collie/sheltie mix) patrolled the rest. If you want to see something hilarious, you need to see a dog herd miniature chickens...

As for 0 to 1 month old seedlings, I always made sure to spread the bio-safe type of slug bait. It only takes one night from one slug to ruin a years worth of hopes.

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lol...Tell me about it! I even caught a slug clinging onto one of my 'Burgundy Iceberg' x op seedlings at a rather more advanced stage, when it had even four or five true leaves! (btw, it threw white flowers, as expected like Iceberg.. it served its prupose, now in heaven, along with the slug.. RIP).

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I know you are against the use of "biotoxic" chemicals in the garden, Jadae, I am of the same persuasion. I hate using some commercial snail baits as they can kill all manner of critters and pets, as well as snails slugs and rats..... btw, we have a beautiful 14 yo Rottweiller here, my best friend.

I have seen on TV some gardeners promoting the efficacy of ground coffee sludge as a snail bait.

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I breed silkie chickens too (and buff orpingtons, rhode island reds, DB plymouth rocks, pekin ducks and muscovy ducks). I have 20 silkie and orp eggs due to hatch on Thursday :) My dog (border collie x curly coated retriever) is hopeless at herding *rolls eyes* but is great at keeping away possums, rabbits, and wallabys from the roses ;) If any of you have deer problems I'm happy to rent my Bo out to you to 'fix' the problem ;)

George... I've not had so much trouble with slugs/snails since adding perlite to the top of the seed beds. It's almost like they don't like the texture and so stay off it (mostly) and that reminded me of something else... diatomaceous earth is effective as a slug barrier. The diatom's silicon-based exoskeletons are sharp to a slug and is reputed to slice them up if they crawl over it causing them to dehydrate... I use to use it around my chook pens to prevent other chook nasties... the chooks roll in it like a dust bath and it controls lice and other little suckers. You can get garden-grade DE here: http://www.greenharvest.com.au/pestcontrol/diatomaceous_earth_prod.html (pool grade stuff has been chemically treated and I would keep it away from seedlings).

Another very cool trick (for the evil saddist gardener who likes to inflict pain on pests and vermin ;) ), is copper metal!!! You take strips of copper metal or coils of uncoated copper wire and put it around the edge of the pot. When the slug crawls aross the copper its slime reacts with the copper and gives them an electric shock! Like a slug electric fence LOL (there's a prac I do with kids at school to demonstrate simple galvanic cells with two plates of metal; one copper and the other zinc. You hook them up to a multimetre and then get the kids to put one hand on each. Their sweaty little hands contain salts and water (an electrolyte) that allows the flow of electrons creating current... the slug thing is a similar idea).

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The copper thing sounds like something you could ,well almost patent, Simon..lol

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I had Silkies, Buff Orpingtons, Rhode Island Reds, Ducks etc, for years. WEIRD!

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There are products on the market made from iron phosphate which kill snails and slugs yet are safe for food, pets and wild life. Two of the brands in the US are Sluggo and Garden Safe. The stuff clogs the digestive tracts of the slugs causing them to starve to death. It isn't attractive to wild life, but I have had one customer report back that her brain doner Cocker Spaniel ate it regularly and only had the runs from it. It breaks down into iron and phosphorus to fertilize the plants. I've used it in clients' and my own garden as well as in nursery applications. Effective, safe and unscented.

The set up I use is a pair of tables with boxed frames. The hardware cloth is stapled to the outside between the frame pieces like a cage. Make a removable lid frame and cover it with the hardware cloth so it's like a shoe box with screened sides, ends and lid. It works, it's easy and quick to put together and rather inexpensive. Rather "rustic", too.

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thx kim

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My snail baits grew furry mould, so I had to remove the whole smelly mess this morning..gross.

I just went out looking for iron phosphate, but the closest I could find to this chemical compound was pelletised iron chelate. I guessed that as pellets however, I could still have the trouble with rats nibbling at them (and of course wrecking the seedlings in the process).

There was no hardware cloth at the store, but there was a copper strip like sticky tape, that can be adhered easily around the diameter of pots, or around seedling benches....I immediately thought of Simon's copper idea, and went for the sale!

So Simon, I am putting the copper idea to the test, on the clino-bracteata, clinophylla seedlings. If it works I will look into into your copper wire application also. I think you are brilliant!

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George, picture this...8" wide fir fencing boards used to make a box. Dimensions are unimportant. You make it as large or small as you wish. You now have an open box, top and bottom. For the bottom, staple window screen over the opening like the grill/screen over the front of a stereo speaker or a window screen. What a concept! This acts as a filter to keep the soil inside the box. Over the window screen, staple half inch hardware cloth to reinforce the window screen. Two by fours can be used as braces under the screens when they sit on their supports, saw horses in my set up.

For the lid, create a frame of one by twos sized so the frame will slide over the top of the deeper box as a lid. Cover this lid with another layer of half inch hardware cloth, stapled to it and the hardware cloth will prevent the lid from from sliding all the way over the lower box.

Does that help to provide a clearer idea (I hope!)?

Here, you can buy copperized sticky tape from garden supply stores for snail repellant. Egg shells and diatomacious earth will both work as snail and slug defense. Supposedly, their sharp points pierce the membranes and they leak to death. Painfully, I hope!

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Yeah, that helps me understand better, thanks Kim.

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I didn't invent it... I only use perlite... they don't seem to like it at all. I would imagine that as the copper corrodes its effectiveness would be compromised. You have to maintain it... You can alos go and buy some kitty litter trays and fill them with water. Put some bricks in there and sit the pots on the bricks up on the bricks... so they have a motte around them.

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lol...

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Apparently oxidation of the copper is not a problem. Anyway I also like your moat idea.. very cheeky!

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That's what I said... I MOAT ;) LOL

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Honestly, I will be doing up a cage thing....soon.

The copper helps in the mean time, that's all.

I will cheat a little however, and try and find some ready-made big metal cage or other ready-made similar sturdy boxed contraption, to save me the bother of the carpentry..yes I admit I can be lazy with certain things..

:-{)

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YOU lazy? hehe I went to Home Depot, one of our major home improvement, one size fits none, stores. Walked in with a list of exactly the number and size pieces of wood I needed, selected the pieces I wanted, had them cut it for me for free. I took it home and assembled it in less than half an hour. Fortunately, I had the hardware cloth from ones which rotted out last year and the other pieces were under the house or in the garage. The whole thing for one table was less than $30 US using recycled materials from previous years.

I'd imagine you should have similar problems we do with the diatomacious earth and perlite either blowing or washing away. I like the image of the plant moats. They should set the stage for you to test for rust and black spot by raising the humidity around the plants.

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lol, truth be known, this coastal climate here is a breeding ground (barometer even) for blackspot (and friends).. there is no need to construct the moat....roflol.
:-{)

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George.. how big are the pots?How many are there? If it's only a few pots... go to KMart (or some other crappy-like store)... and see if they have some of those collapsible mesh, tent-like covers that go over food served outdoors... use a couple of horse shoe nails to pin one side to a piece of board so you can flip it... should give you enough protection at least until the seedings are big enough to fend for themselves... and then you can take your fam. out for a picnic afterwards ;) win win...

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You know, that is a great idea for ultra-small pot numbers, Simon!

Since I stuck the copper tape on, I hope that should be enough??

At the moment, there are the 7 "Viru babies" and a couple flower carpet OP seedlings. The pots are 9cmx10cm, you know the blue plastic ones they use to sell vege seedlings?!

I promise to get the cage done, soon. I have NO EXCUSES now that my laziness in carpentry has been exposed...

I hope I am entertaining some of you rosarians out there in cyberland with my antics today!

:-{)

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If you haven't tried the coffee grounds yet, pick some up and start putting it around any and all of the plants that are naturally attractive to slugs and snails, and it will deter the snails over time (it took about two applications for my snail infested plants to be snail free). We are having a monsoon season right now, and snails usually proliferate, but I really have to search to find them now, finding them only in the wood pile where I havent applied grounds. Peets Coffee and Tea (locally) really have the nicest, cleanest grounds, bagging only the expresso. Starbucks dump the filters and all in the bags, and have to to be sorted through. I use these for my compost pile. The grounds supply NPK of 2,.3,.2, so they do give a bit of an acidic fert. to anything applied. I also found this following bit of info on one site regarding coffee grounds and fusarium: http://www.cabi.org


TI: Induction of biological suppression of Pythium in soil by addition of
organic matter.
OT: Induction d'une resistance biologique aux Pythium dans les sols par
l'apport d'une matiere organique.
AU: Bouhot-D
AD: Station de Recherches sur la Flore Pathogene dans le Sol, INRA, 17 rue
Sully, 21034 Dijon Cedex, France.
SO: Soil-Biology-and-Biochemistry. 1981, 13: 4, 269-274; 12 ref.
AB: Incorporation of a composted mixture of 50% coffee grounds, 25%
poppycake and 25% grape meal 4 days before sowing into a soil naturally
infested with Pythium sp. decreased damping-off of cucumber seedlings in
proportion to its application rate: at 20 g l-1 it reduced the disease by
70%, and at 60 g l-1 suppressed it almost completely. Survival of cucumber
seedlings was increased by 25%. Treating the organic matter by irradiation,
by heating, with antibiotics or with fungicides before its incorporation
into soil provided evidence that the suppression was caused by changes in
the fungal flora of the soil. The organic matter produced a proliferation of
soil fungi, especially Mucorales: destruction of the Mucorales reduced
suppression.

Maybe this is why I had little to no damping off last year.
Not sure. Jackie

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Yeah, Jackie. Coffee grounds have been mentioned as slug repelling....Thank you for your effort in giving this information here!

I still think I need to construct a cage, it seems 100% foolproof and so simple (once someone has actaully bothered to make it).

No problems with the copper tape so far, which has solved a lot of troubles for me, in the interim.

(:-{)

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Well, just to be honest here, one of my tomato seedlings was "topped" by slugs last night, and the pot was taped with the copper product. Thank goodness I used these seedlings as stooges to test the whole idea of the copper. Luckily the roses were not touched.

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George, the cage won't prevent slugs from entering unless you use window screen for the lid. Anything large opening will allow them to slither right through. What I use them for is keeping birds and other vermin out so they don't eat the seeds, seedlings and remove the tags. We have slugs as well as the Brown Snail. Horrid things! My favorite "bait" is to pick them up and throw them into the middle of the scalding asphalt street. Most get run over by passers by, but many cook before they are spared the broiling.

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I got some mould-resistant snail bait, so I don't have to faint from the foul mouldy odour, next time I want to water the rose seedlings.

They are all safe and growing. They are like my babies. ROFLOL.

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One thing I just can't seem to understand from this thread, is the apparent lack of snail/slug problems for some breeders here. I just don't get it?

I had like 20 OP seedlings of 'R.Bracteata' about 4 months ago, that were all at their cotyledon/first true leaf stage, when one morning I got up to find nearly all of them absolutely ravaged by slugs. I had to throw the lot out, it was a mess, and I am not exaggerating.

It is rather strange..maybe it is the local slug population that has acquired a taste for rose seeldings. Who knows.

I can't afford that sort of massacre happening ever ever again, I have learnt my lesson.

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They're environment dependent. I can guarantee you that they're really bad here. This is the bottom of a valley set next to a temperate rain forest, lol. Not only are the slugs numerous here but they are also extremely large (look up banana slug on google image lol). When I lived in South Dakota and Texas, all I recall were those little tiny snails the size of a pill. They're nothing compared to here.

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I was once told that slugs and snails are one of the reasons that roses cannot be imported into the USA from Australia.

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Well, there are a ton of species between the two, so maybe it is likely that the USDA doesn't want to contend with some that may even be more harmful to agriculture and environment. The thing about slugs and snails is that it usually isn't a matter of having them or not if you live in certain locales or creates those locales artificially, but its usually a matter of how many and at what density. Like some other critters, they spread like wildfire and they have the appetite to match.

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That's why I have ducks ;)

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Ok. At least I now don't feel like some alien with some unique problem. The SCALE of the problem seems to be different in differet locations??

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Hi George,

The old Aussie beer saucer still works, if cats &/or dogs don't get into it first.

Rod

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Hi Rod!

Yes, I have heard about the beer idea as well..LOL

I am not a typical Aussie that drinks beer though :(

The "mould resistant" snail baits have worked 100%, so for now I am sticking with them. All the Clinophylla and Clinophylla/Bracteata seedlings I have been nursing are just fine as a result of these effective baits.

Of course rat/mouse issues (digging up sown seeds and such) are a matter that require the cage idea that Paul Barden and Kim have suggested, and I will get to that soon!

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Has anyone used IRONITE? It is a product for greening up lawns. Our local rose society was using it for greener leaves on the roses and low and behold the snails loved the stuff and it made them sick enough to die. Here on the north coast of calif. we have alot of snails, slugs and banana slugs. My wife has 3 small dogs and they are not attracted to Ironite at all. The last 3 years I've just thrown it randomly around the rose garden with very good success in slowing down the life (isn't that better than saying killed) of the snails and slugs.

jack

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Jack.

Yeah.. Like Kim Rupert said, the iron compund alternatives are out there on the shop shelves.

For now I'm sticking to what has waorked 100%, despite my dislike of biologically toxic chemicals.

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Here are some anecdotes on the local hiddeous slugs that roam around here, just for fun!

It has rained and fogged fairly frequently this winter, which is great for us, and great for the slugs!

The multiflora seedling shown below, can thank a bucket-load of snail bait thrown around it for saving its life....Even with a relatively huge amount of baits thrown all around it, I discovered today, a few days after this shot was taken that the shiny appearance it had in this picture was due to slime from a slug. I hadn't paid any attention to this reflectiveness at the time I took the picture..LOL.



So even with huge amounts of baits, some slugs are able to cross over onto the seedlings and slime them/even chew on 'em, before perishing..One actually crossed such a wide bait barrier and ate a whole cotyledon off a cucumber seedling!

One completely topped an olive seedling, leaving only stem and roots for me...I had not bothered with slug baits on that one, I assumed slugs would not go for olive seedlings..LOL!

Anyways, here is the same seedling this morning, after I scraped a whole heap of sticky slug slime off leaves and stem....YUK!



A silly local teenager was lately reported in the news as having eaten raw one of these slugs, as a party trick to show off to his friends. He ended up in intensive care soon after with some very serious illness. Definitely a case for not touching these things, or else washing one's hands very well if contact is accidentally made with them, or their hidddeous slime!

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Ultrasonic pest repellers, suitable for use around, dogs, cats, birds and fish. The one for mice seems to work for squirrels. Other forms are for deer, teenagers and crowds.