How to Stop Garden Slugs

Slugs can be a real pest in the garden. Unlike earthworms and spiders, they don't seem to have a particular purpose in keeping your garden healthy - in fact, they make matters worse by chomping their way through all those juicy-looking leaves you painstakingly planted with your own hands. If you happen to grow vegetables in your garden, there's nothing worse than coming outside to discover all your lettuces have been all but eaten again - but what can you do to prevent these slimy creatures from decimating your garden entirely?



Not everybody wants to kill every insect that gets in their way, so if you want to avoid the slug pellet route, never fear - there are other cruelty-free methods you can employ in order to stop slugs from chewing on your tulips. One such way is to create an environment they won't enjoy slithering over. As slugs have such soft, sensitive bodies, if you put down biodegradable food waste such as broken eggshells or coffee grounds around your plants, you repel slugs by creating a type of ground they won't want to travel over - thus protecting your precious plants from their jaws. What's more, the addition of such food waste into your soil can help to create healthy, fertile ground so it's a tactic that works for your garden's health in various ways.

Another trick for repelling slugs without killing them is to install copper rings around your plants which administer a small charge that the slugs cannot stand. They will quickly learn to avoid the rings and your plants will, again, be protected. While the only purpose of the copper slug rings is to prevent slugs from getting to your plants, they have been shown to be incredibly effective and will ensure your garden will remain slug free.



Finally, if you have a garden pond, you might want to think about introducing a frog or two into the habitat. Slugs form a part of the natural diet of frogs and, while this method does mean that one or several slugs will lose their lives, it's a far more natural method of getting rid of them than adding any nasty chemicals to your garden.



Slugs can be a real pain when it comes to healthy and wholesome plants, but by following the above tips you stand a far greater chance of protecting your perennials than if you simply let them slither amok.