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Thanks everyone, there are some wonderful suggestions on here - I've certainly got some new ideas to try - and hopefully it will help readers to avoid the dreaded pellets.
Sorry to any grapes who've heard me talk about this before, but my gripe with pellets is that although they appear to work (in a small area, in the short term) there's evidence to suggest that they are a complete waste of money and just make the problem worse!
The problem is that slugs don't die instantly after eating pellets. Some still move a fair distance after they've been poisoned and that's how other animals get killed.
A hedgehog can eat its own bodyweight in slugs a night. All it takes is for a hedgehog or bird to eat slugs that have eaten pellets and you're reducing the natural predators - so hey presto - you get lots more slugs!
These are the things the manufacturers dont tell you:
1 Pellets contain stuff that actively attracts slugs to your plot.
2 Many pellets (even some of the organic ones) also kill the ground beetles and other predators that eat slugs.
3 Birds, cats, dogs and other creatures are 'starvation tested' by the manufacturers to see if they eat slug pellets.
4 Generally animals wouldn't be daft enough to eat the pellets unless they are really starving, but they eat the poisoned slugs.
Manufacturers are making a lot of money out of the pellets and they know us gardeners are a caring bunch so they try to mislead us by making pellets sound animal-friendly. It's the gardening equivalent of calling factory-farmed eggs 'barn-fresh' as if those poor chooks aren't living in crates!
Sorry to any grapes who've heard me talk about this before, but my gripe with pellets is that although they appear to work (in a small area, in the short term) there's evidence to suggest that they are a complete waste of money and just make the problem worse!
The problem is that slugs don't die instantly after eating pellets. Some still move a fair distance after they've been poisoned and that's how other animals get killed.
A hedgehog can eat its own bodyweight in slugs a night. All it takes is for a hedgehog or bird to eat slugs that have eaten pellets and you're reducing the natural predators - so hey presto - you get lots more slugs!
These are the things the manufacturers dont tell you:
1 Pellets contain stuff that actively attracts slugs to your plot.
2 Many pellets (even some of the organic ones) also kill the ground beetles and other predators that eat slugs.
3 Birds, cats, dogs and other creatures are 'starvation tested' by the manufacturers to see if they eat slug pellets.
4 Generally animals wouldn't be daft enough to eat the pellets unless they are really starving, but they eat the poisoned slugs.
Manufacturers are making a lot of money out of the pellets and they know us gardeners are a caring bunch so they try to mislead us by making pellets sound animal-friendly. It's the gardening equivalent of calling factory-farmed eggs 'barn-fresh' as if those poor chooks aren't living in crates!
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