Spiders and slugs!

[tgplp]

Hi everyone! I'll start of with the slug problem... I have a lot of slugs in my small hoophouse, and I don't know how I should get rid of them. I've just been throwing them out of the window (haha!) and weeding to make sure they have no where to hide. Unfortunately, that just means they hide in my lettuce plants! Any ways to get rid of them? I'd rather not kill them (but I will if I have to) and I don't want to use pesticides.


My other hoophouse problem are the spiders! I'm sure that they're great and all, but a couple of weeks ago a bunch of spider egg cases hatched in my hoophouse, and there are little yellow spiders EVERYWHERE! I like spiders, but I don't want them crawling all over me everytime I open the door to my hoophouse. How should I deal with them?

Thanks very much,
Taryn

[janezee]

Taryn, there's no good way to live with slugs. Go to the Dollar Tree and get a package of bamboo skewers, which are massively useful for all kinds of uses, and start making slug kabobs. Truly, the least messy way to deal with them. I stick the slug, then leave the skewer in the ground. Supposedly, the other slugs come to feed on their family members, and you can get the rest of them. The little grey slugs are the most damaging to lettuce. The bigger brown ones are more attracted to brassicas.

I have soaker hoses in my raised beds. The large brown slugs seem to think that I installed them for their comfort. So, late at night, or early in the morning, it's easy for me to find them.

The cheap beer in the wine bottle works really well for me, too. Especially in the flower garden. They sure love my irises.

I love the spiders in the garden. Hoop house not so much. They'll mostly be gone in a week or two, because there won't be enough food for all of them to thrive. Leave that window open!

j

[Crandrew]

Originally Posted by janezee

Taryn, there's no good way to live with slugs. Go to the Dollar Tree and get a package of bamboo skewers, which are massively useful for all kinds of uses, and start making slug kabobs. Truly, the least messy way to deal with them. I stick the slug, then leave the skewer in the ground. Supposedly, the other slugs come to feed on their family members, and you can get the rest of them. The little grey slugs are the most damaging to lettuce. The bigger brown ones are more attracted to brassicas.

I have soaker hoses in my raised beds. The large brown slugs seem to think that I installed them for their comfort. So, late at night, or early in the morning, it's easy for me to find them.

j

+1 I use these methods. You must kill them don't worry they won't go extinct.

[livinonfaith]

Beer, beer and more beer!

Seriously, slugs love a good party!

You don't even have to feel bad about them dying. At least they had a good time first!

[meadowyck]

Hello, when I gardened up north I would spray and 10% ammonia solution, with a small garden spayer on the ground around my plants that were being eaten out of this world. To keep spiders down in our barn I would use our leaf blower about once a week to know down cob webbs.

Good luck with you moving those critters on.

[lakelady]

oh my that's gross I hate slugs. I have them too and when I can, go out in the mornings with a disposable cup of salt. Pick them and plop them then throw the whole cup in the trash outside so I don't have to look at them again. ewww. Might try the beer in the wine bottle trick, but i have slugs in my containers too now. In fact, this year, I am seeing so many new bugs I can't believe it. I'm going to try dusting with diatomaceous earth as well. No ideas on the spiders, sorry. I feel for you with the slugs though, ick!

[Crandrew]

I'm a single guy and open...but deff not for this type of lady found her today, she had to go.

[tgplp]

Originally Posted by janezee

Taryn, there's no good way to live with slugs. Go to the Dollar Tree and get a package of bamboo skewers, which are massively useful for all kinds of uses, and start making slug kabobs. Truly, the least messy way to deal with them. I stick the slug, then leave the skewer in the ground. Supposedly, the other slugs come to feed on their family members, and you can get the rest of them. The little grey slugs are the most damaging to lettuce. The bigger brown ones are more attracted to brassicas.

I have soaker hoses in my raised beds. The large brown slugs seem to think that I installed them for their comfort. So, late at night, or early in the morning, it's easy for me to find them.

The cheap beer in the wine bottle works really well for me, too. Especially in the flower garden. They sure love my irises.

I love the spiders in the garden. Hoop house not so much. They'll mostly be gone in a week or two, because there won't be enough food for all of them to thrive. Leave that window open!

j

Ewww! Slug kabobs? That's hilarious... and gross. Thanks everyone, the spider situation has really gone down.

Yikes, Crandew! Black Widows are pretty scary. Where did you find her? I've only seen a couple of male black widows, one in the corner of my garage, and one under some wood in the woodpile.

Taryn

[Crandrew]

under one my pepper pots rims eek one misplaced finger and that would have been bad. I probably find 1 each month.

[livinonfaith]

Thankfully, I haven't found any Black Widows at my new house, but the one we lived in a few years ago had quite a few. Once my son was playing with a fire truck in his sand box and there was one on the truck! After that, I would go out and look over my son's toys before he could play with them.

My brother had an infestation on his daughter's swing set! He's not a big pesticide fan, but he immediately had the whole back yard professionally sprayed.

[macbettz]

Can someone detail the wine bottle/beer method for slug control? Thank you

[janezee]

That would be my method.

I've tried saucers of beer here, but it rains too much and doesn't work. The slugs have a party, and go their merry way home afterwards.

Being an avid recycler, I have a few wine bottles from time to time.
I go to Walgreens, and buy the cheapest beer in the area, $2.99 for a six pack, and I pour a few ounces into each bottle, make a small depression in the ground for the bottle to lay on the side with the lip of the bottle even with the soil, and bob's your uncle.

Once or twice a week, I just upend the bottles, at a distance from my nose, and then refill. I have about half as many this year as I had last year, which means I still have a hellacious number of them, but I really can see a difference in my flower beds. My vegetable beds aren't planted with much yet, and I'm away from home right now, so it's harder to tell. But my peas looked amazing when I was home a week ago.

Hope this helps you out. Where are you from, macbettz? I was born in Meriden. I never saw slugs there.

jane

[dice]

The idea with beer is that slugs (and perhaps snails) are attracted
to the yeast in it. They crawl in to get the yeast, fall in, and drown.

You could line up a piece of gutter, cap it on both ends, fix some kind
of plastic shield on top to shed rain (maybe 1/2 of a piece of pvc or abs
pipe cut the long way, big enough to fit over the top of the gutter),
fill it with beer from a keg, and get a massive slug harvest.

[troad]

Dice,
Excellent idea but I think Jane has a fondness for getting the wine bottles. Would be a shame to deprive her of that pleasure. Besides how is she going to hold the gutter at arm's length when it needs refilled?

[janezee]

j