I have frogs and slow worms on the allotment. I also have plenty of birds frequenting the plot and still the war on slugs is lost..I win a few battles...they left the lettuce alone this yr but have devastated chard...
It's not a good idea for any predator to eat all it's prey - that way lies extinction for the predator! A healthy balance is the ideal situation for them.
Frogs, toads, birds and hedgehogs etc help us ... we can't always rely on them to do the whole job ... sometimes we need to lend them a hand (organically) if we want to grow plants that are susceptible to slugs and snails.
And don't forget, it's the little slugs that do most of the damage to our plants - most of the big slugs eat already decomposing plant matter and other slugs!
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Frogs/toads alone won't clear a garden of every slug - it's not that simple. Like Clari, I had a huge pond in my last garden, so it was frog/toad city. We had loads of other mollusc predators as well, but that didn't mean there weren't any slugs! Climate/location, time of year and the type of plants that are grown are all factors.
Looking to achieve a balance is the aim, and it isn't an instant fix - it requires patience
It's a place where beautiful isn't enough of a word....
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Dove, I no longer find that it is the little slugs that do the damage. Maybe I have those foreign ones everyone talks about, but my garden is plagued by large, orange coloured slugs that eat everything. If I go out on a warm evening I find susceptible plants literally coated in these slugs, flowers, leaves and stems. For example, I have a group of three modest plants - I forget the name but related to cow parsley - which were just putting up new shoots. One evening I removed 70 slugs from this group and over 50 the next. There is very little they won't consume and they certainly don't confine themselves to rotting material.
I'm another one who has more frogs and toads than anyone could possibly count, I live in a rural bog, when the babies come out you really can't walk without squashing them, lawn mowing is mass murder, but I can easily pick 5ltrs of slugs in under 20 minutes on an evening.
I found that a combination of hand picking, and the organic slug pellets keeps the numbers down, it doesn't eliminate them of course, but it keeps it so I can also get some vegetables.
Really oddly my slugs do not like hosters. either that or I have the only slug resistant hosters known to man.
Thank you everyone, for giving me such wonderful feedback sadly, I've learned that frogs are not my cure all. But I've also gotten a few wonderful tips
What I've learned from this conversation is that I need to take an approach that combines everything.
Posy, I saw a large orange slug in my garden this summer, that means there are more, right?
So I suppose I will put out a small plastic pool in the hope that it will attract frogs, although they won't do the whole job. I will also use beer traps. I've read somewhere about coffee and crushed Egg shells too.
Do you know if diatomaceous earth works? That cropped up on a few blogs too. If I'm going to war, I'm going in all guns blazing.
Many thanks to all of you wonderful people, it feels like an extended family!
Don't panic, one orange slug could be a perfectly innocent British one. You only need to worry when you see them in large groups! Picking them off is the best solution.
Posts
I have frogs and slow worms on the allotment. I also have plenty of birds frequenting the plot and still the war on slugs is lost..I win a few battles...they left the lettuce alone this yr but have devastated chard...
It's not a good idea for any predator to eat all it's prey - that way lies extinction for the predator! A healthy balance is the ideal situation for them.
Frogs, toads, birds and hedgehogs etc help us ... we can't always rely on them to do the whole job ... sometimes we need to lend them a hand (organically) if we want to grow plants that are susceptible to slugs and snails.
And don't forget, it's the little slugs that do most of the damage to our plants - most of the big slugs eat already decomposing plant matter and other slugs!
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Frogs/toads alone won't clear a garden of every slug - it's not that simple. Like Clari, I had a huge pond in my last garden, so it was frog/toad city. We had loads of other mollusc predators as well, but that didn't mean there weren't any slugs! Climate/location, time of year and the type of plants that are grown are all factors.
Looking to achieve a balance is the aim, and it isn't an instant fix - it requires patience
I live in west central Scotland - not where that photo is...
Dove, I no longer find that it is the little slugs that do the damage. Maybe I have those foreign ones everyone talks about, but my garden is plagued by large, orange coloured slugs that eat everything. If I go out on a warm evening I find susceptible plants literally coated in these slugs, flowers, leaves and stems. For example, I have a group of three modest plants - I forget the name but related to cow parsley - which were just putting up new shoots. One evening I removed 70 slugs from this group and over 50 the next. There is very little they won't consume and they certainly don't confine themselves to rotting material.
Oh dear Posy, it does sound as if you have Spanish Slugs which eat much more living plant matter than our native Arion ater slugs
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Oh Posy that sounds awful! I'm afraid I'd be getting the beer traps out if I had monsters like that.
I think I'll need the beer myself......
I'm another one who has more frogs and toads than anyone could possibly count, I live in a rural bog, when the babies come out you really can't walk without squashing them, lawn mowing is mass murder, but I can easily pick 5ltrs of slugs in under 20 minutes on an evening.
I found that a combination of hand picking, and the organic slug pellets keeps the numbers down, it doesn't eliminate them of course, but it keeps it so I can also get some vegetables.
Really oddly my slugs do not like hosters. either that or I have the only slug resistant hosters known to man.
Thank you everyone, for giving me such wonderful feedback
sadly, I've learned that frogs are not my cure all. But I've also gotten a few wonderful tips 
What I've learned from this conversation is that I need to take an approach that combines everything.
Posy, I saw a large orange slug in my garden this summer, that means there are more, right?
So I suppose I will put out a small plastic pool in the hope that it will attract frogs, although they won't do the whole job. I will also use beer traps. I've read somewhere about coffee and crushed Egg shells too.
Do you know if diatomaceous earth works? That cropped up on a few blogs too. If I'm going to war, I'm going in all guns blazing.
Many thanks to all of you wonderful people, it feels like an extended family!
Don't panic, one orange slug could be a perfectly innocent British one. You only need to worry when you see them in large groups! Picking them off is the best solution.