My compost is coming next week, so but and the seasonal ritual I seem to have fallen into is thinking about the periphery first. Last year, I focused on planting pollinators along the woodchuck fence, and I did two things: I planted perennial twiny honeysuckle and morning glories near the fence posts, and I planted white clover along the mesh. Although the honeysuckle never flowered, the clover was a roaring success: It actually drove out the switchgrass, and of course clover fixes nitrogen in the soil as well.
So, the vines came back successfully, and I'm planting more clover; pink since for some reason white clover has doubled its price this year. Inside the garden, I will keep planting marigolds at the margins of the tomato patches to deter pests, but I'm also thinking of putting dwarf sunflowers at the brick edgings of the garden paths for phyto-remediation, as well as to attract pollinators.
Still thinking peripherally, however: The grapevine warns that snails are going to be big this year, I'm guessing because of the cold and wet. I don't know how snails get into a garden, though. Presumably they don't sporulate, and snails don't don't have wings, so I imagine they crawl; so is there anything I can plant along the woodchuck fence that will repel them? I'm told snails eat anything, so while I did deter soft-bodied slugs from eating my Napa cabbage with crushed eggshells, I'd have to make an awful lot of omellettes to protect my garden from soft-footed snails.
And no, I don't want to pick snails off the plants at night; that sounds like work.
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clover is fabulous!
plus, it's supposed to be edible. i've planted some red clover [for the bees and the nitrogen-fixing bacteria], just a small test patch, this year. between the heat, the drought, and a couple of brief spells of torrential rain, it hasn't fared too well so far, but it's on my list of "if it lives, it lives, and if it doesn't, it doesn't" plants. we'll see what happens.
i'm thinking about trying BIG sunflowers myself, just for the fun of it.
snails are just slugs that carry their houses around with them, so i think you're stuck with doing whatever works to keep the slugs at bay.
Snails!!
Oatmeal (uncooked) sprinkled around plants is good. The beer thing didn't work that well here, and one of the dogs drank some of the beer -- not doing that again!
Also, this year I've been sprinkling paprika around the baby sunflowers to get rid of the snails and so far it's working in about 80 percent of the area. Something is still chewing on them, but it doesn't seem to be snails -- no slimy trail around them. It looks like other spices work, too, so whatever you can pick up cheaply might do the job.
"Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better." -- Albert Einstein
Oatmeal is certainly cheaper than eggshells....
For slugs, I used eggshells and that green granular "Slug-B-Gone" stuff or whatever it's called. Both worked, but for obvious reasons I prefer eggshells. And oatmeal sounds even better!
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win. -- Mahatma Gandhi
Cornmeal, too
and there are more remedies here (comment #5 mentions cornmeal).
btw, you don't have to hunt them at night. I go out every morning with a plastic bag and commit dozens of snailocides. Karma is one thing; destroying my plants is something else entirely.
"Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better." -- Albert Einstein
That the honeysuckle didn't
That the honeysuckle didn't flower means nothing. Perennial vines often take a few years in their permanent position to flower.
As for slugs and snails, there's rumor that a strip of copper around your bed...or rings of it around particular plants will repel them. Copper's expensive.
Slug and snail baits do work, and there's now one that's "organic" (and so stupidly expensive). The old style is not harmful if used in correct amounts; it's got a chemical that turns all the sugar in the slug/snail's body into alcohol...effectively killing by hangover.
I think the best way though is to buy a toad house and get yourself a resident slug/snail eater in the garden. A toad will eat up to 100 slugs/snails every damned night.
You may be able to repurpose something into a toad house. Basically it needs to create a dry, cool and shady home for the toad with a small entrance. Ceramic works best, and the made one's have a little chimney structure on top
“Don’t believe them, don’t fear them, don’t ask anything of them” - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
Toad Hall!
(Poop poop!)
Can I attract toads to the garden? Buy them from a supplier? That sounds like the best solution, just introduce a new node to the web of life in the garden.
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win. -- Mahatma Gandhi
That's a good question
My guess is that that if you build a home, a toad will come. Since you've got slugs and snails there's an abundant food source. With shelter provided it's toad heaven.
I have no idea about ordering a toad, but you could certainly go to the woods or a park and capture one to give it a new, cushier existence in your yard. I'll bet the toad wouldn't even mind.
“Don’t believe them, don’t fear them, don’t ask anything of them” - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn
er, how's the woodchuck
situation?
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alas is crocheting daily at http://memorycrochet.blogspot.com/
Thanks for asking
I think I'm going to go for the gopher grenade solution, but I going to wait for the friggin rain to stop before I open up the crawl spaces looking for wholes. That diagram of their burrow that Hipparchia dug up really spooked me -- as long as school bus? I don't think a week for the rain to clear --- grr! -- will make all that much difference to the foundations, and I'm not going to be planting anything before Memorial Day anyhow.
First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win. -- Mahatma Gandhi
dug up