How to get rid of slugs in a greenhouse: the best methods and life hacks

Why am I fighting slugs in the greenhouse?

In my area, I sometimes notice the “naked slug” variety. The small mollusk settles not only in open areas, but also in greenhouses, cellars - wherever there is high humidity and shade.

Their harm to cultivated plantings is great - they love to feast on fresh, young plants with soft and succulent foliage. But plantings with hard tops are avoided. The most favorite food of gastropods is cabbage: white cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, Peking cabbage, Brussels sprouts.

Therefore, in order not to lose the harvest, I begin to fight the pest as soon as the first individuals are found in the greenhouse. If the problem is neglected, voracious mollusks will fill the entire space of the greenhouse, destroying valuable plantings.

Preventive measures

Experienced farmers know the problems they will face next season, so they carry out a set of measures to protect peppers from slugs, increasing plant immunity and reducing the level of favorable conditions for the proliferation of pests.

The following agrotechnical measures against slugs are used both in open ground and in greenhouses:

1. Digging and loosening the soil . Clutches of eggs and adult slugs overwinter in the ground. Frequent loosening and autumn digging will prepare the soil for spring planting - it will be free of pest larvae.
2. Rotation of crops in one area . This approach prevents slugs from breeding in the soil.
3. Careful approach to seed selection , planting disease-resistant plants.
4. and underdeveloped plants during germination
5. Regular ventilation of the greenhouse , keeping them clean: all debris, foreign objects, remains of plants and leaves are removed in a timely manner. Clean tubs, pots, and racks for seedlings from rotten parts of plants and wash them.
6. Weeding beds , removing rotting lower leaves and stems, improving air circulation between plantings.
7. Immediate removal of soil infested with larvae.
8. Keep the soil for planting outside the greenhouse , preferably in direct sunlight, so as not to infect it with larvae.

Signs of slugs in a greenhouse

I learn about the “adventures” of gastropods by their characteristic features:

1. Damage only to soft, delicate plant tissues - eaten away spots and holes remain on the leaves.
2. Silvery shiny traces remain along the route of the pests. You will see them on the leaves, on the soil, and on the walls of the greenhouse. Mucus is produced by gastropods to facilitate movement, as a protection against drying out of the body.

Having determined that slugs have settled in the greenhouse, I do not put off getting rid of them.

Chemicals

Natural methods do not always bring results, especially if the summer is rainy. In this case, you have to use chemicals.

Using the following drugs, you can get rid of slugs and snails:

• Mesurol. These are granules that are scattered abundantly in the habitats of mollusks. Suitable for use even at low temperatures. It turns out that the effect is almost immediate - the snails are deprived of mucus. The drug is used 2-3 times, depending on the complexity of the situation and until the pests are destroyed.

• Nemaslug. The product contains nematodes that penetrate the body of snails, causing their slow death. After about 5 days, the pests stop feeding and die after 10-14 days.

  
  A product is used to spray or water plants. It is enough to carry out 1-3 treatments per season.

• Anti-slip gel. The product has no odor. The drug is applied strictly around the plants. A coating is created that provides reliable protection against slug attacks.

When grown indoors, the area around the greenhouse is treated, since pests can penetrate inside through underground tunnels.

The use of chemistry does not leave its mark on the environment. Therefore, it is strictly forbidden to exceed the dosage specified in the instructions.

Chemical methods for getting rid of slugs in the garden

The fastest way to get rid of it is to use store-bought pesticides. But it has a lot of disadvantages:

1. Destroys not only slugs, but also beneficial insects. Not safe for pets.
2. A waiting period is required - early harvesting of greens can lead to serious poisoning.
3. Chemicals are not safe for humans. It is better not to bring children to the site for approximately 5-7 days after treatment. The procedure itself must be carried out taking care of personal safety - wearing closed clothing and shoes, a respirator, and safety glasses.
4. Part of the product will inevitably end up in the soil - the chemicals completely decompose within a month. Throughout this period, garden plantings will absorb toxic substances from the substrate.

Both complex (against all garden pests) and special formulations are effective against slugs. Among the most popular:

• "Storm";
• "Slug Eater";
• "Ferramol";
• "Predator";
• "Stopulit";
• "Bros Snakol";
• "Meta";
• "Schnecken Linsen."

A safer drug is special fertilizers. They do not contain toxic chemicals, but they contain substances that mollusks do not like. Among the most effective are calcined mineral fertilizers. But I only use them at stages when greenhouse plants really need feeding.

I do not recommend scattering dry mineral fertilizers over the garden bed in hopes of controlling slugs. Oversaturation of the substrate with calcium and salinization of the soil are no less harmful to plantings than an invasion of pests.

Another method I tried was iron sulfate. I sprinkle a little product on the migration routes of gastropods - they can be easily identified by their characteristic shiny trail. I also dust the perimeters of the beds. But I try to use fertilizer in reasonable quantities so as not to harm the plantings.

Iron sulfate is good because it does not lose its properties when exposed to sunlight or water. Does not wash off during heavy rains or watering. Slugs quickly die from contact with the substance before reaching the “feeder”.

iron sulfate against slugs

Pest Control

When the temperature in the greenhouse is high, the slug produces fewer offspring and eats worse. Accordingly, it causes less damage to the crop. Therefore, in case of a sharp drop in temperature, it is necessary to equip greenhouses with additional technical heating sources. Chemicals, technical equipment for processing plants, and traditional methods will also help in the fight against the pest. But for the battle against slugs to be successful, it is better to use a set of measures.

Manual collection

You can collect slugs by hand. It is better to do this early in the morning, while carefully inspecting all the stems, the inside and outside of the leaves. Look into dark corners, check all metal and wooden surfaces. When the pests are collected in a jar, they need to be burned or drowned. In this way, you can collect the maximum number of parasites and protect plants from chemical exposure.

Important. Slugs are carriers of E. coli; you need to wear gloves when collecting pests. The mucus itself is thick and difficult to wash off your hands.

Chemical method

One of the effective remedies is the drug “Metaldehyde”. Available in the form of powder or granules, other drugs are being developed on its basis, such as “Slug Eater”, “Thunderstorm”.

Positive properties of the drug:

1. No additional preparations required.
2. Moisture-resistant, remains on plants after rain.
3. Does not lose its properties for 21 days.
4. Completely destroys the pest (the dried organism is destroyed after 48 hours).
5. Does not harm the soil or beneficial insects.
6. Economical (consumption rate - 50 g per 20–25 m²).

What to sow in early spring in a greenhouse in order to have time to harvest before the main plantings

Directions for use: sprinkle the product between the rows around the plants - the smell of the product will attract slugs. They will eat it and die.

Important. If you treat the soil and plants at least 2-3 weeks before the crop ripens, the berries and vegetables will become poisonous.

Precautionary measures: carry out treatment with the drug in protective gloves. While working, do not touch your face or eyes, and if the powder gets on open areas of the body, rinse with plenty of water.

Traditional methods

Many gardeners do not use chemicals to kill slugs; they prefer safe traditional methods.

1. Hot water destroys slugs, even if they are in the soil at a depth of 10–20 cm. But this method is not harmful to plants.
2. Treatment with a 3% hydrogen peroxide solution will rid the plants of the pest.
3. Dusting plants with slaked lime, superphosphate, tobacco. This method will repel parasites. Dosage: 30–40 grams per square meter, apply in the evening or at night.
4. Vinegar has a poisonous effect. Dilute 0.5 cups of vinegar per 10 liters of water, spray plants and soil.
5. Do not collect slugs, but crush them with slate. Leave crushed pests between the beds; new slugs will eat up their relatives. The operation is carried out until complete destruction.
6. A coffee drink will repel slugs (stir 2 teaspoons in a glass of cold water).
7. If you water plants and soil with salt water, the pests will secrete less mucus.

Traps and protective strips

If you want to protect your greenhouse plants from slugs without using toxic chemicals, you can use a trap or protective strip.

Spring disinfection of the greenhouse after tomatoes: how not to leave the infection to new plants

Mode of application:

1. Place a trap in the ground, pour in beer or diluted yeast. Fill the container so that there is 2 cm left to the side.
2. The slugs will fall into it and drown.
3. Place the trap where pests are most found.
4. In the morning, check the trap, collect the pests, and destroy them.

Fact. If you create an artificial barrier from crushed shells, coarse sand, crushed nut shells, then these materials will cut their belly and the pests will die. And if you add salt or ash to such an obstacle, they will simply eat away the slugs.

Agrotechnical methods for getting rid of slugs

Effective and safe ways to eliminate uninvited guests from the site are useful agricultural techniques. I'll share what I use myself:

1. Regulation of soil moisture. I wrote above that slugs prefer a consistently moist environment. You can combat them by adjusting the watering schedule - reduce water procedures as much as possible to create uncomfortable conditions for slugs. I use a little trick - after watering, I sprinkle the greenhouse beds with a thin layer of dry garden soil.
2. Mulching. The delicate bodies of slugs will not like obstacles such as eggshells, wood chips, or sawdust. Mulch also optimizes the humidity of the substrate, absorbs moisture, remaining dry after watering, which is uncomfortable for mollusks. Slugs will also find any sharp, rough or rough surface of the mulch unpleasant.
3. Attracting natural enemies. In the wild, slugs are a favorite food of frogs and hedgehogs. Attract animals to your property by building shelters for them.
4. Planting “unpleasant” plants. From my own experience, I judge that slugs do not like the specific smell of lavender, thyme, laurel, parsley, rosemary, sage, and santolina. Therefore, I try to plant these crops around the perimeter of the greenhouse.

I find agrotechnical means to be preventive – in the event of an invasion, I turn to more radical methods of struggle.

How to protect yourself?

How to protect plants from slug invasion? The best defense is prevention.

The garden, vegetable garden, greenhouse must be clean, without foreign objects on the surface of the earth (shelter for pests).

The pest must not have a food source. So, if you don't want to pick slugs from cucumbers or young cabbage, protect them with a barrier.

To do this, you can use plastic panels that need to be dug into the ground, leaving 40 mm above the surface. Tin or metal can also be used.

If you don’t have the necessary materials at hand, you can use regular nut shells and scatter them around. Slugs simply won’t get through it.

You can also mulch the beds with sawdust, sand or wood ash.

It is worth knowing that slugs can appear both in gardens, vegetable gardens and greenhouses, as well as in cellars and basements. You can learn more about how to destroy pests in basements from the article “Fighting slugs in the basement (cellar).”

Traditional methods of fighting slugs in a greenhouse

I’ll also tell you about popular folk remedies, whose effectiveness I have verified through my own experience.

Spices

An excellent panacea for voracious shellfish is ordinary kitchen seasonings. I sprinkle spices on the surface of beds attacked by pests. The most effective is red pepper. But rosemary, cilantro, and black pepper are no less effective.

Small particles of seasoning irritate the delicate body of slugs, and sometimes leave serious burns, from which the mollusk dies. This scares pests away from the greenhouse and forces them to look for new habitats.

The disadvantage of this method is its short duration. Gastropods quickly develop immunity to spices - the offspring of surviving individuals already crawl freely over the obstacles of spices towards fresh foliage.

Beer

Like mole crickets, slugs are attracted to the smell of this alcoholic drink. So I use it to create a hook:

1. I pour some beer into the bottom of glass or plastic jars.
2. In the evening, I bury the containers in the greenhouse so that the neck is level with the surface of the earth.
3. Since slugs are nocturnal, they will crawl towards the traps at night. In the morning I collect the “catch” by hand.

For several days in a row I replace the stale drink with a fresh one and fish out any pests from the cans. If you don't buy beer, you can replace it with kvass, fermented juice, jam or compote.

Plant traps

A simple, economical and safe method for removing slugs from greenhouses. Place fresh vegetable waste between the rows - I use cabbage leaves, tops of tomatoes, cucumbers, and lettuce.

To destroy as many pests as possible, I collect them early in the morning, before the sun hits the greenhouse. In this way, I “kill two birds with one stone” - wood lice often visit plant traps.

Another old-fashioned method is the use of old boards. In the evening, I grease one side of the wood with kefir, yogurt or another fermented milk product. I place it on two bricks or stones with the smeared side down and leave it in the greenhouse overnight. The slugs arrive to the aroma that is appetizing to them - in the morning all that remains is to collect the gastropods.

Salt

A fairly effective method of getting rid of shellfish is regular salt. It is sprinkled on the migration paths of pests and gastropods themselves. Salt corrodes their bodies and leads to death.

But I do not recommend that you get carried away with this method, especially on beds with cultivated seedlings. This will lead to salinization of the soil, making it unsuitable for farming.

Lifestyle of snails and slugs

Laying of slug eggs under a cabbage leaf
All land mollusks are hermaphrodites and have reproductive organs of both sexes, so they can produce both sperm and eggs. Therefore, each individual has the potential to reproduce. They can lay eggs up to 6 times a year. The maturation process lasts about 2 years for snails, and slugs reach maturity in about 3-6 months (depending on the species).

In areas with mild winters, such as southern coastal areas, these clams can be active all year round. When it's cold, they hibernate shallow below the surface of the earth. When it’s hot, there’s drought, slugs burrow deeper, and snails fence themselves off from the outside world with a parchment membrane to protect themselves from drying out, most often attaching themselves to tree trunks, fences, or walls. During this period, they live off stored fat and can remain without food for about three months. This ability is one of the many reasons why they have been able to survive through millions of years of evolution.

In wet spring, rainy summer, and autumn, slugs and snails really annoy us, eating strawberries, cabbage leaves, and other garden crops. The strawberry bends slightly to the ground, and you look - in the morning half of the berry has been bitten, spoiled, and the leaves of cabbage or beets sparkle with large holes, eaten by these animals with the help of a horny arched jaw - a grater. They spoil seedlings, young shoots of many vegetable crops, fruits of cucumbers, tomatoes, tubers, and potato foliage. They cause significant damage to winter wheat by eating sown grains and young shoots. Small holes are left on the leaves and fruits of vegetables, and young slugs, having hatched in the upper layers of the soil, gnaw holes of various sizes on potato tubers.

Slug (or slug) is the commonly used name for a number of gastropod mollusks that, in the course of evolutionary development, have undergone the loss of their shell. They develop, grow quite quickly, and can reach the adult stage in a matter of months if environmental conditions are favorable for this. Some varieties produce offspring twice a year - in spring and autumn. Garden areas are usually favored by field and netted slugs.

Slugs are thick, oily, slippery creatures that have no limbs but two sets of tentacles at the front of their body. They do not have a shell, so they are called naked mollusks. The absence of a shell allows slugs to live in the soil, spend more time underground, there they also find food for themselves: potatoes, carrots, beets, and we lose part of the harvest.

Slugs in storage facilities contaminate vegetables, leaving traces of congealed mucus, soil, and fecal residues, which contributes to the rotting of the crop and shortens its shelf life. And by crawling on different plants, snails and slugs spread various diseases.

With the onset of autumn coolness, slugs penetrate into the country house, leaving behind long silvery stripes - dried mucus. Admit it: it’s unpleasant when you accidentally step with your bare foot on a wet, cold, slippery slug or suddenly hear the unpleasant crunch of an accidentally crushed snail.

The long, moist, soft, slippery body of the snail is protected by a hard shell, where it hides when disturbed. Its typical shell is cone-shaped and twisted into a spiral. They, just like slugs, belong to the class of invertebrates (animals that do not have a backbone), they can live under any conditions - in the sea, fresh water, on land in humid conditions. Both have two pairs of tentacles on the head with organs of smell and touch. One pair of tentacles is longer than the other and looks like horns. These “horns” are eyes that are located at the tips of a long pair of tentacles. A short pair of tentacles is used for smell. Tentacles are very important to them. They don't have ears, but their amazing sense of smell helps them find food.

After the rain

These mollusks are less active during cold or, conversely, hot, dry months. On humid days they can most often be found under cabbage leaves, under boards, and stones. There they hide during the day, and in the evening they come out for food. In wet years they can cause significant damage to garden plants. They feed on leaves, stems, flowers, and fruits that are close to the ground, such as strawberries, tomatoes, and cucumbers. They feed mainly at night, although they are sometimes active during the day when it is cloudy or raining. During hot, dry weather, they may be temporarily inactive.

Even such beauty can be destroyed

How to get rid of slugs on flowers

Gastropods also love to eat decorative plantings. Hosts are especially attractive to them. I made an interesting observation: the pest gnaws the petiole of a leaf - it falls to the ground. The mollusk descends and climbs under the leaf, receiving both a “house” and provisions.

I fight slugs in the flower garden in the same ways:

1. I make water traps - I dig containers of liquid level with the ground, adding it as it dries.
2. I mulch the flower beds with peat, ash, sharp walnut shells, sand, coffee and tea.
3. I struggle with shading and high humidity - I prune and tie up spreading plantings.

If there is a dominance of slugs, you can turn to chemicals - “Thunderstorm”, “Slug Eater”, “Predator” and so on.

Natural ways

From “slippery guests” you can use the following methods and remedies that are easy to prepare yourself:

• Chicken egg shell. Pre-dry and grind. Sprinkle the ground around the plants with egg crumbs. Pests have a very soft and delicate body, so even the slightest damage causes severe pain. In the same way, use river sand, crushed shells, coffee grounds, pine needles, nut shells, etc.
• Red pepper, mustard, coffee (powder). Take 2 tsp. any product and pour boiling water (200 ml). Leave the solution until it cools down. Spray the plants with the prepared product early in the morning, in the evening or in cloudy weather.
• Ammonia. Dilute with water in a ratio of 1:6. Using the resulting solution, use a spray bottle to treat all plants that have been affected by pests. The product has a weak concentration, so it does not burn the leaves, but the pungent odor repels mollusks.
• Salt. Take coarse salt and sprinkle it along the paths in the garden, over compost heaps. It is destructive to pests, as it literally eats away the bodies of snails and slugs. Use salt carefully and not too often, as there is a risk of severe soil salinization.
• Ash. Ash provides reliable protection for plantings. Scatter the ash over the beds, forming closed circles around them. Pests will not be able to cross such a barrier, since the ashes burn their bodies.
• Soda. Sprinkle areas where slugs and snails accumulate with plain baking soda. Use a solution to spray plants - for 10 liters, take 100 g of soda and 25 g of soap.
• Vinegar. Treat the plantings with a vinegar solution - 50 ml of 9% vinegar per 10 liters of water.
• Coffee. Take used coffee grounds and plant them in the soil. Prepare cold coffee and treat the plants with the resulting solution.
• Infusion of wormwood. Grind the wormwood and add water in a ratio of 1:5 (500 g of plant per 5 liters of liquid). Stir the mixture once every 2 days. After 4 weeks the product is completely ready. Filter and use for spraying plantings.

How to get rid of slugs in the garden

Keep in mind that not only slugs can spread in the garden, but also pests similar to them, against which other methods are effective. Black “slugs” often crawl on pear and cherry leaves. These are actually the larvae of the slimy cherry sawfly. To combat them, it is better to use Kinmiks. "Bitoxibacillin", "Inta-Ts-M".

When real slugs appear in my garden, I solve the problem by building a simple trap:

1. I take an ordinary plastic cup and put a treat on the bottom - juicy grass, beer, pieces of fresh vegetables, cabbage.
2. I lower a tube into the container through which the mollusk could easily crawl through. But in such a way that it does not touch the bottom of the glass.
3. The easiest way is to pass the tube through a tight lid, make a hole in the latter, and seal the glass tightly. If there is no lid, then the container can be closed with tape, adhesive tape, cling film - so that there are no other entrances in the glass except the tube.
4. I bury the glass up to the neck in the soil. I lower the tube level with the surface of the earth so that the slug can easily climb into it.

The trap is ready - the pest, sensing the bait, will climb into the cup, from where there is no exit. All I have to do from time to time is collect the mollusks I come across and refresh the bait.

I don’t forget to check the cellar in the garden house:

1. I arm myself with a bucket of water and a flashlight and collect pests from the walls by hand.
2. In the fall, when there are no supplies in the cellar, I dust the walls, floor, and ceiling with a mixture of chalk and ash. If there is an invasion of gastropods in the storage facility, it is more effective to use a sulfur bomb.

Another simple and safe trap is pieces of linoleum, roofing felt, old boards, plastic, and a bunch of plant debris. Any shelter that will be attractive must be damp, dark and warm. All I can do is lift the traps from time to time and collect hidden mollusks from there.

slug trap

Snails on the site - what to do?

If we take into account the fact that we cannot influence either global warming or the rate of spread of new species of gastropods, then the prospects for pest control look depressing.

However, there is still no need to despair. If you follow all agrotechnical recommendations and use not one, but several time-tested methods of combating mollusks, then you will still be able to significantly reduce the population of slugs and snails living on your site.

Preventing the appearance of slugs in the greenhouse

Although I know how to quickly and easily remove pests from a site, I still try to prevent their appearance:

1. I make sure the garden is well-groomed and clean. “Plantations” of weeds are an excellent place for life and reproduction, from where they spread throughout the entire garden, including greenhouses. I don’t allow heaps of plant waste to form where it’s dark and humid – I store it in time and burn it. I don’t forget to thin out cultivated plants - the abundance of side shoots and constantly moist soil attract gastropods.
2. I do not practice continuous, thickened plantings. This environment is the most comfortable for slugs. They exist in optimal humidity, protected from the sun, and have unlimited access to foliage. I thin out the plantings, remove unnecessary lower branches, ensure good aeration in the greenhouse - I periodically ventilate the greenhouse.
3. I do not allow pests near food sources. Slugs do not fly and do not dig underground passages, which is why it is quite easy to build barriers for them. Protect the ridges with slippery plastic panels or sheets of iron with sharp edges, burying them 3-5 cm into the ground. If you have children, it is better to replace such traumatic obstacles with small ditches with nut shells or eggshells - slugs will not be able to overcome such protection.
4. I mulch the beds. I try to cover the ground around plants attractive to slugs with a thin layer of sawdust, fine sand, gravel, and broken shells. Tiny particles of mulch stick to the clam's wet body, preventing it from moving toward food. Ash acts in a similar way. I spread a protective layer of ash around the plantings. Sticking to the bodies of slugs, it irritates and burns their integument.
5. Watering with warm water. The method is good only for cabbage plantings - it can harm other crops. Gastropods do not like to settle in beds that are watered with water heated to 40-50 C.

Eliminating slugs from your site is not an easy task, but it can be done. Conventional manual harvesting, agrotechnical techniques, and folk methods are also effective here. If the pest is dominant, use pesticides after weighing the pros and cons. But the easiest way is to turn to prevention in order to prevent the appearance of harmful gastropods in the garden.

Causes of snails

Despite their harmful nature, snails are an important part of the ecological system. Gastropods crawl from area to area in search of food. They also migrate, looking for favorable conditions to live and reproduce. Once convinced of the attractiveness of the site, the snail begins to live actively.

Snails usually choose moist and warm places for themselves that are not exposed to sunlight. Mollusks find areas where it is damp, where there are stumps and half-rotten boards attractive.

Pests enter along with cuttings, seedlings, and vegetable plants that are infected with larvae of gastropods.