HELP - what pesky creature is eating my pansy flowers, etc?

[JuneBug]

No matter where I plant pansies - in beds or in pots, something always chews on the flowers and ends up completely destroying the plants. I also have problems with wallflowers being chewed, and this morning I noticed lumps out of white hellebore flowers. In addition, a newly planted creeping phflox which for a few days had delicate pink flowers has been denuded. It is not slugs as there are no traces at all, and I am liberal with the pellets (shame on me, I know). We are in mid-Wales, at 850 ft.
Can anyone suggest what the culprits might be and what I can do about it (if anything). Many thanks.

[alan refail]

Bore da JuneBug. Croeso i'r fforwm.

One possibility would be sparrows. Do you have as many in Ceredigion as we do here? They will go for flowers, especially crocus, preferring the purple ones.

Having said that, we have a lot of sparrows and a lot of violas which have survived the hardest winter we've ever had here and are looking tremendous - a mass of flower. And they have not been touched. But I suspect bird might be your problem if there are n o slug trails.

[snooky]

I have the same problem with my pansies and I thought it might be earwigs but on Googling, Wikipedia reckons that they are not active until May.

[JuneBug]

Alan, I don't think it can be sparrows because of the location of the plants, but I will keep an eye out. Yes, we have plenty of the little devils here in Ceredigion!

Snooky, I wondered about earwigs, too. What with climate change, it could be that they are already active. I suppose I would have to go out at the dead of night to catch whatever it is at it, but I might pass on that!
I noticed similar damage on daffodil flowers today. It is frustrating.

[Geoff]

I think it is molluscs that aren't leaving a trail for some reason.

[glallotments]

Slugs nibble our pansy flowers.

[JuneBug]

Yes, slugs in the beds I can understand, but can they crawl across gravel, up a wall, across the top of the wall, up the sides of a pot, and then launch themselves at the pansies, all without leaving a trail anywhere?
I suppose the answer must be "yes" .......

[glallotments]

Eggs could have been present in the pot already.

[JuneBug]

Eggs could have been present in the pot already.

Yes, of course, you are right. I guess the moral of the story is to use slug pellets wherever planting pansies or other such vulnerable plants, although I don't really like to. Copper rings are not an option - too expensive as I have so many pots.

[FelixLeiter]

Can you post a picture of the damage, JuneBug?