I was given two hostas by a friend of my mother's a couple of year's ago. They were badly eaten by slugs. Re-potted and copper tape applied to the rim of the pots - absolutely no problems since. Tape is quite cheap. Now three plants and all looking magnificent.
I moved my hostas into pots three years ago, and (fingers crossed!), they haven't had any slug damage at all in this time. I put a band of copper tape around the rim of the pots and this seems to have done the trick, they look great on the patio. I found the cheapest place to buy copper tape was on ebay.
I did buy new pots ready to pot up my hostas last year but the weather dropped very quickly in the autumn so I decided to leave them til this spring, getting them out the old pots was tricky I nibbled away with a small trowel around the edge of the pots then turning them on there sides and getting my hand down the gap I got them out, this is not a job you can rush and its ideal if you have someone to help but now my hostas are spectacular, I've put copper tape around the tubs and have only lost one leaf to the wind, no slugs around yet,I think I got rid of that many last year going around at night with the torch and grapefruit skins in the boarders I think I've thinned them out, please don't use slug pellets I managed last year collecting by hand and the slug and snail population was unbelievable there were snails all over the conservatory and house walls at evening time and slugs 4 and 5" long all over, my neighbours thought I was mad but it paid off.If you put grapefruit half skins around your boarders and veg patch you will be amazed when you lift them to look under the amount of different slugs there are I didn't get rid of the small black ones just the brown with orange edge ones. You will also be amazed the large chunks eaten of the skin by that type.try it its a cheap way which is armless to wildlife.
As a keen hosta grower, please could you reissue the recipe for the slug control fluid with garlic bulbs which was on the site last year in a short video. I passed it on to lots of gardening friends and now can't find where I wrote it down! It really does work.
Can anyone help? Two years ago on BBC Gardener's World, someone gave recipe for a garlic wash to soak hosta daily. I tried it and great results. Recently lost my notes from that programme. I know it was 4 cloves of garlic boiled for 4 minutes in one pint of water. Can anyone recall the rest? Hope you are all enjoying the hostas in your garden. Many thanks.
Has anyone had any experience of raisng hostas from seed? What are the chances of the seedlings coming true if you save your own seed and is cross-breeding them difficult?
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Where did you get yours from?
I would like another but www.pesthelp.co.uk have currently sold out!
See my blog article
http://www.plantadvice.co.uk/blogs/show_blog.php?id=6