Copper Strip Fight Against Slugs

[julia-mag]

Can anyone tell me please, on the rolls of copper strip sold to repel slugs, is it real copper sprayed onto paper, or is it just copper colouring?. I feel it is too flimsy to be the real thing as you just stick it together! Does it deteriorate in the rain? To purchase enough real copper rings for the garden would be astronomical! As my neighbours have mostly concreted their gardens over the slugs have been congregated in mine!

[douglas9401]

I don't know how it's made or what from, Julia, but I do know that it doesn't work on my planters.
Hedgehogs are a better solution.

[Georgiesmum]

I leave any slugs and snails to the hedgehogs. Thats natures way. Hedgehogs are almost extinct as it is.
without taking away their food source.

[julia-mag]

How many hedgehogs will I need ? I do see two at a time (much later in the summer) around 9p m every night.

[julia-mag]

Georgiesmum , My garden is like a supermarket for hedgehogs, but too many get killed crossing the road to get there.!

[Hypognosis]

Looks like real copper, to me, julia. Metallic shine is hard to fake and a spray-coated surface wouldn't manage it. Recall how gold and silver paint always leaves a matt, grainy surface, which will not shine.

I've only looked at photos of the products, so I'm guessing that the bulk of the product is the tape, which needs to be able to withstand lengthwise pull forces as you peel it off the reel and the glue. The copper foil could easily be a lot thinner than kitchen foil and more like sweet-wrapper foil.

Meanwhile, all these paced-over gardens is probably why our hedge-pigs are dying out. :-/

[Hypognosis]

* paved-over

[retrocop]

I haven't seen a hedgehog in our London suburb garden for at least 30 years. :-( Plenty of mangy foxes though.

[julia-mag]

hypognosis - The actual product when removed from its backing is very flimsy and (to me) feels like when you remove a stamp from 'self adhesive' book' of stamps. I used it on one of my planters last week and as we are in for some heavy rain apparently, will be able to see if it deteriorates. At just over £4 roll I have only tried 1 to see if it really works. It would take several rolls to cover rest of my planters, hence my asking anyones opinion of the product.

[Hypognosis]

@retro

Slug pellets did the hedgehogs out of a way of life, I suspect. As soon as they're on the wane, the slug population booms, so more gardens get slug-damaged, so more slug poison gets sold.

Or it's the traffic, as julia says, or it could be the "urban heat island" effect, waking them out of hibernation before the food is on the scene.

[-SharonA-]

Like Retropcop, no hedgehogs here in London. Plenty of slugs though. I hate when they even end up in the house!! Oh and plenty of mangy foxes too. They're getting so brazen.

[alavahalf]

Last year I bought a roll of 30 meteres and tried it on plant pots and along the edges of raised beds... it was not great quality and it did'nt work. The slugs still crossed it.
A better way of stopping the slugs that did work, was to collect seaweed from the beach and scatter it round pots and beds. The slugs dont like the salt and when the weed dries out it goes crispy .. they wont go near it.
... just an alternative if you live near a beach !

[julia-mag]

Thanks Alvahalf, Will try that, lots get blown ashore in the gales. Any number of these so-called 'wonders' do not live up to expectations, but I have to try ! We used to go out with torches from dusk onwards and collect hundreds of slugs but it didn't dent the devastation of the tender plants. I try now to grow slug-resistant plants like Phlox, Geraniums, Japanese wind flowers, and put tender plants in baskets etc, but they climb the walls to stretch across to the baskets! I have just purchased to youngish magnolia trees (only grow to about 5ft) for the patio and apparently the slugs will go for the flower buds before anything else in the garden !! Found that out too late.

[Hypognosis]

I've heard it said that people who try to grow vegtables but keep getting slug damage should invest in some 'sacrificial' plants, to divert the dlugs' attentions. Sounds like magnolia is the big ticket!

OR… the fact that other local gardeners have given up the struggle means yours is now the only food source for some distance and they have to congregate on your plants or else starve.

[julia-mag]

We found that when growing young cabbage plants (which the slugs clear off in just one attack) that by dipping fresh lettuce leaves into solution of 'sluggitt' and putting them in a ring around the plants (also dahlia shoots) that diverted the slugs away. It was time consuming but it worked, but we gave up trying to grow cabbage/cauliflower etc., and now the poor dahlias do not even get through the soil, when I think they should be showing, I gently dig around and find they have been eaten off below surface, which is why I have resorted to pots and planters and baskets!.

[paddywak]

You could always try an old trick.cut the tops off several plastic bottles to leave a container about 6 in deep, insert the inverted tops and trim the them level with the container bury them around the garden so the top is flush and then tip a couple of inches of beer into them and leave overnight.the slugs are attracted by the smell of the beer climb into the bottle and can't get out because of the inverted tops and bobs your uncle.

[Hypognosis]

@julia

One extreme alternative would be to reduce your garden to just bare soil (or plain lawn) for a year, no pots or planters, or whatever is attracting them and hope the slugs either die off or migrate away.

I heard of one tale, where a gardener with a snail problem used to pick them up and deposit them in woodland, a mile or so away from home but, he thought, fresh ones were taking their place. As an experiment, he painted numbers on one night's batch and, to his surprise, his labelled snails reappeared within days of release, having trekked all that distance to do so. I struggle to accept that the mollusc brain can support a homing instinct but today's news about monarch butterflies navigating across a continent with only a simple neural 'circuit' then maybe this snail tale isn't so far-fetched, after all.

[Chipchopper]

If you like coffee, you may like to try the spent grounds around the base of the plants.

[Togo]

It is copper Julia. Copper is a soft metal, like gold, and can be beaten or rolled to a very thin plate as can gold(think Gold Leaf). It is an expensive way of keeping slugs away although it works. We used it around 2 pots with Hostas in them that snails and slugs love, and it did prevent them getting up the side of the pots. A better long term solution is to make your own compost which develops little microbes called Nematodes, which are deadly to slugs and snails. Otherwise there are a number of Nematode products available that can either be added to water prior to watering or direct to the soil.

[alavahalf]

julia ... sorry for digressing, but can I ask a question on your post ?

Togo .. can you elaborate on "your own compost" ... I have used Nematodes and I know they work, but they are an expensive means to an end.
What are your ingredients for the compost that creates nematodes.

Allotment vegetable grower .. with 10 cones and 2 heaps.. I know you will understand !

[julia-mag]

Perfectly o.k. Alavahalf as that interests me too, My compost has not been used for 3 years and the bottom of the pile is fine. Did not know it contained nematodes though . Had almost millions of 2inch worms when I was feeding with cabbage/potato peelings weeds etc etc.