The vegetable garden without getting tired

[Doris]

Well, well, well, I couldn't do like you, too many slugs, it's just starting to calm down a bit, I let it grow a little more than that, otherwise I don't eat .......

[Did67]

Try wilted wild lettuce (leaf lettuce), placed between two plants. In principle, this is where you will find slugs in the evening (for "oranges", at home, it worked at 95%). For others, it is to be tested.

[Doris]

I will try, but your remark pointed me to another observation: I still have a lot of orange slugs, but for two years they have not been in the majority, it's brown with black spots that have taken over. So I'm already going to see if they have the same appetite for wild lettuce, but I'm also wondering about this change in population. In any case their appetite for vegetables is different from that of oranges, carrots live in peace, and for turnips it is the carnage, but really.

[Did67]

It is the more complete ecosystem which settles down, with the auxiliaries which go with it!

The "black" are alas more painful: they bury themselves, and eat the roots underground. It is the champions of the small white notches in the radishes ... And there, many auxiliaries are inoperative: ground beetles, staphylins, etc.

The "gray", to my knowledge, commute: bury themselves during the day, go out at night ... An auxiliary has a chance!

At worst, it is a case of force majeure, justifying the "bio-control": watering with a solution of parasitic nematodes of the genus Phasmarhabditis hermaphrodita (abbreviated as Ph on the packaging - it is the P which is capital and lowercase h , unlike pH!)

[stephgouv]

I had read I do not remember where a certain variety of slugs was "canibal" and ate another variety.
Is it true???

[Did67]

It is the big slug-leopard that has this reputation. I do not know !

https://www.rtl.be/info/magazine/animau ... 41424.aspx

[Doris]

This year I'm doing the "bio-control" thanks to the nematodes, no choice, there are too many, thanks to the very mild winter, and especially black ones. The ferramol helped a little, the beer traps too, but it's not enough. Although ten days ago, thanks to a little cold snap, it calmed down a bit, but with the mild weather it starts again each time, and it's really the devastation: out of 50 turnips transplanted in early February I will have maybe 5. On two lines of 6m of radish, we have 95% loss. Dwarf peas, we pretty much get by, first seedling of 100% snow peas. Salads get by thanks to ferramol and traps. A cohabitation is not possible, it is like for the vole: producing more to eat either even in spite of the predators does not work, if I produce the double, I will also have twice as much loss.
As for the leopard slug: I confirm that it eats other slugs. On the other hand in the link that you quote, one can read that they prefer in the first phase of their life of the decomposing matter, and there I have a reserve, because when I had small, therefore in first phase , they mainly attacked my healthy young plants.

[phil53]

Doris, can you say a little more about the uses of nematodes I personally am a little disappointed maybe I put it when it was too cold anyway I don't see much difference with the warm weather full of slugs the only solution that works is the electric fence I also have lettuce leaves that limit the damage how much slugs eat small seeds.

[Doris]

I had the nematodes at a time when they were announcing a drop in temperature, and since at that time the activity was less, I kept the package unopened in the fridge. I started with the softening of the temperatures and the resumption of the slugs, it's been about a week now, and I see that there are seedlings of the surfaces that have risen and nobody touches them, the salads do not are under more attack either, maybe a little bit more in the radishes. The minimum temperature of the soil is given for 10 to 12 degrees, if you do like me, apply several times, you have to keep in the fridge for max 10 days. You have to keep the ground well moist, but that does not pose any problem under the cover. Also, any anti-slug treatment must be stopped a few days before the establishment of nematodes, which do not survive long in the ground without finding a slug.

[Did67]

With the hay, I would discover or only water in the bottom of the furrows ... I have never used them, but I imagine that "perched" in the hay, which dries up, their effectiveness would be zero ...