Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: hubballi on June 28, 2012, 17:11
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After having almost 100% success with spraying garlic on the foliage of various plants to keep slugs and snails off, for some reason it isn't working with my Red Duke Of York potato plants. The first few weeks they kept off but this week they have stripped it almost bare. It's absolutely infuriating :( I
Firstly, why would the same garlic work on some plants and not others ?
Secondly, will this decimation affect the growth of the potatoes ?
Thanks.
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there are just so many of them this year, everybody is suffering :(
If they strip all the foliage I suppose it will, the other thing is that you don't know what they are doing to the forming potatoes :(
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I use the organic slug pellets, which have always worked very well for me. But I've never put down so many pellets before as I have this year. Normally I put them down once or maybe twice around vulnerable plants, and that's enough. This year I'm reapplying them every week, not because of rain but because they're being eaten by slugs :)
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Same here - I've always found a scattering of organic slug pellets have been all that's needed, but this year I am putting loads down every evening & by morning they are all gone...as are most of the plants they were supposed to protect. Cucurbits are the worse affected, but there isn't anything they haven't had a go at. It's driving me mad as I rely on my veg patch to help tide me over the winter when I don't earn so much money...they have decimated my marrows, leeks, carrots & cabbage & my brussels are just tiny stumps. Funnily enough, the one thing they aren't going for is lettuce, which is normally the most popular.
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Again, why do they leave some plants like Hostas that I have sprayed with garlic but not others ? It's this horrible humidity they love. I am going out with a torch tonight. I hardly saw any earlier this season until this weather kicked in.
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I have used the organiv ferric based pellets this year. Yesterday, in desperation, I resorted to the bad old blue ones and this morning the plot is a killing field.
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I posted the same thing a few days ago, the organic ones don't seem to be working this year :(
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The organic ones have never worked for me.
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My large plot is right by a stream with hundreds of frogs so I don't usually need to spread slug pellets around that much either but I did yesterday. They have had a go at my sprouts - they are not quite stalks but were nearly there and they had had a go at the potatoes as well. I never usually put pellets around the potatoes at all - but I have now. I am using the 'organic' ones due to the frogs and wildlife around but will not hesitate to change if they don't work. Hope next year is better.
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I posted the same thing a few days ago, the organic ones don't seem to be working this year :(
Oh, they're definitely working. You don't normally see the dead slugs but the snails take longer to die, and I've seen plenty of those dead or dying around my plants. There's just a ridiculous number of slugs and snails this year.
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The answer for me has been to leave some dustbin and compost bin lids around for them to shelter under and the pond frogs come and dine out in my makeshift cafes. Most mornings I find the shelters empty and my veggies are intact - so far.
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Again, sprayed with garlic (which works with everything else) only to find them all over the Red Duke Of York again.
Can anyone tell me why it doesn't work mysteriously on this one plant ?
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in my garden i once counted around 30 to 40 black slugs one early night :blink:
i've had to use the blue slug pellets from wilko's because they started eating the fenugreek and i couldn't see where they were. they also had goes at the cabbage and cauliflower. pellets came out and caught 20 around the fenugreek with their slime everywhere and 5 around the cabbage. they haven't touched the potato's yet.
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Can anyone tell me why it doesn't work mysteriously on this one plant ?
Probably just a matter of taste, we all have different ones!
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I have 6 bags of spuds and it's only the Juliettes and Anyas which they go for.
I went slug hunting and the plants were HEAVING with HUGE brown slugs that were quickly snipped. I think this method is best.
I have also reverted to using the non-organic pellets in areas where the chooks can't go and they have been really effective. Slime splotches everywhere! Maybe the slugs get tolerant to the other organic poison?
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The old-fashioned metaldehyde blue pellets poison slugs and snails directly, hence the visible "evidence", whereas the ferric phosphate so-called organic pellets disrupt their digestion so they crawl away to die so you are unlikely to see them.
Neither is a very cheery prospect for those like me who don't like killing things, but the damage they can cause is impossible to ignore, and this year in particular they are present in such large numbers that all-out war has had to be declared.
I use the organic version scattered at the bottom of the hedges which surround my garden and are overnight hiding places for slugs and snails, and the metaldehyde ones nearer to the most vulnerable crops, which are mostly netted so that the risk to other wildlife is minimised.
Seems to be working, although constant vigilance is required in these current weather conditions.
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If this is the case
The old-fashioned metaldehyde blue pellets poison slugs and snails directly, hence the visible "evidence", whereas the ferric phosphate so-called organic pellets disrupt their digestion so they crawl away to die so you are unlikely to see them.
then why did the damage only stop after the organic pellets were replaced with the old fashioned ones? :dry:
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If this is the case The old-fashioned metaldehyde blue pellets poison slugs and snails directly, hence the visible "evidence", whereas the ferric phosphate so-called organic pellets disrupt their digestion so they crawl away to die so you are unlikely to see them.
then why did the damage only stop after the organic pellets were replaced with the old fashioned ones? :dry:
Not sure Viettaclark was saying that the organic pellets didn't work, just that there was visible evidence that the metaldehyde ones did work!
It's possible that because of the way the organic pellets work that the slugs still have time to inflict more damage before it starts to take effect - I think they do help keep the overall population down, although without the visible evidence it's impossible to be sure, which is why I've gone for the belt and braces approach. :)
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I wonder if the slugs (of which there were lots and lots in spite of slug pellets) which have cause the leaves on potato plants to turn brown and dry. I don't think it is blight because the stalks still look healthy, no sign of black or gunge or anything?
Anton
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found this article from The Sun.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/4407044/Invasion-of-the-monster-slugs.html
and Daily Mail article
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2168011/Invasion-slugs-Following-soggy-summer-attack-gardens-despairing-allotment-holder-tests-best-ways-rid-them.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
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I went slug hunting and the plants were HEAVING with HUGE brown slugs that were quickly snipped. I think this method is best.
What a vile way to kill a living creature. I am sorry but as much as I don't like slugs I think this is just barbaric.
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found this article from The Sun.
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/features/4407044/Invasion-of-the-monster-slugs.html
and Daily Mail article
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2168011/Invasion-slugs-Following-soggy-summer-attack-gardens-despairing-allotment-holder-tests-best-ways-rid-them.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
Much the same being discussed here:
http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=96236.msg1068639#msg1068639
;)
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Again, sprayed with garlic and big orange slugs all over them. There are hardly any plant growth left now. I dug down and found one very small red potato :(
If I leave them will they still get bigger ?
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The slugs will get bigger but the potatoes won't if they have no foliage! :ohmy:
I understand your reluctance to kill animals but your deterrent plan is not working in this instance - it's no doubt a difficult one for you but when a pest becomes more than just a minor irritant you have to take effective measures or accept the consequences.
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Everytime I search for this post "hubballi potatoes" it doesn't ever come up.
Anyway, I am puzzled why they are all over these Duke Of York potatoes, even when sprayed with the very effective garlic (even my hosta's are not being touched). I pick off about ten slugs and snails. 5 mins later and as many again. IT DOESN'T MAKE SENSE ! :mad:
It doesn't stop them destroying these particular plants. A guy on Gardener's world was interviewed as to how he kept all his Hostas slug free. he said he spayed the early leaves with garlic and they were never touched. I have grown Duke Of York before and never had this problem. One thing is for sure, I will never grow them again.
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if only they ate grass i wouldn't have to bring lawnmower out so often :lol:
i get a lot of magpies but surprised to see the clever birdies don't eat them but go for the bread in the food cage instead :blink:. if i find any slugs moving about i just pick them up and throw onto the grass and these spanish black ones are not that slimy but so far blue pellets are doing the job
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Everytime I search for this post "hubballi potatoes" it doesn't ever come up.
In search, click the advanced search button. Then type potato (your thread is potato and not potatoes) and your user name in the name box, and this thread is the first on the list ;)
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Oops. My mistake. Sorry :nowink:
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Well I wasn't doing too bad slug wise until this week. Looked at my Charlotte potatoes in the bag and... we... they've gone from leafy greenery to sticks! Think I'll just havest what's in the bag this weekend and see what I get (got a good harvest from the one in the ground I dug up last weekend and they were only planted a week apart), but the bag hasn't had quite so much sun exposure.
So far I've not seem to many slugs around the veg patch or the back garden, they've been mainly in the front garden but I think they are making their way as I saw some on the patio this morning. The chickens will eat the small ones but not the large!
H :)