Kitchen Garden Forum

Although I grew plenty of spuds this year,I do find on pentland crown a fair bit of damage from slugs,though sheer quantity saw me through.
Can anyone tell me of either a really good method of protection,or a good spud slugs don't go for?
I also grew pink fir apple,which were pretty much left alone,but I also like good mashers.
Answers eagerly awaited.
Reagards-Bold

I forgot to say,I grow too many for nematodes to be practical price-wise

I've been told that

a) lining the trench with soot or (tip from my grandad)
b) lining the trench with fresh cut grass (tip from top allotment spud grower on GW)

both help eliminate slugs.

I have not however, tried either method as I'm not that fond of spuds.

I just scatter slug pellets every couple of weeks or so all over the plot, even in mild spells in winter, seems to do the job, keeps the blighters down

gloworm wrote:I just scatter slug pellets every couple of weeks or so all over the plot, even in mild spells in winter, seems to do the job, keeps the blighters down

I'll try both those tips, grass cuttings sounds interesting

Evening Boldverg,
My Uncle always reckoned that soot is the best deterrent against slugs and always used when he could get hold of it.
If you do use soot make sure that it is well weathered otherwise you may damage your potatoes.

I always put a sprinkling of slug pellets along the row before I fill it in.

I have used one application of Nematodes this year as I bought a large packet half price at Harrogate flower show.

Very few potatoes had any damage, and even the Sarpo Axona that I left in until the end of October only had about 6 small slug holes in 45 lb of tubers.

Usually Kestrel is pretty slug free, so is Picasso and Sarpo Axona and all three make good jacket potatoes and mash.

I've stopped growing Maxine as it seemed to attract slugs to such an extent that they were unusable. I suppose they could be used as a lure to keep the slugs off all the other potatoes, but would more likely be a breeding ground from where they would spread.

Someone on another forum puts black poly down, then after a while lifts it up & scrapes the blighters off, might try it as well as pellets

I think a great deal depends on the varieties you choose!

Two years ago (before the big blight) I tried one long row of Maris Piper, for roasting, as well as my normal, Dunluce (earlies) and Sante (maincrop.)

They were all grown in the same area, the Dunluce was slug damage free, Sante had some damage, but the Maris Piper,"ALL" were completly riddled, unuseable.

So I will not try them again!
Though I expect someone else will have a different experience with them to me!

Cheers!!

My method of dealing with slugs last year was to hunt them at around 10.0 to 11.0pm with a torch and a pair of scissors. I reduced the slugs considerably by this method. Gets the neighbours puzzled to see a bloke poking around with a torch late at night, must think I'm prospecting for gold.