Where did all the slugs go?

Grenage

I gave up planting anything young in our garden because an army of slugs would immediately rasp it to the roots.  Every morning the ground would be covered with their trails of doom.

This year - nothing!  We put a pond in three years ago so the frogs from the tadpoles we introduced have started to reproduce.  Blackbirds now seem to spend most of their lives in our garden, but the only other change has been changing the lawn from grass to creeping thyme.

Is it the weather, or dare I have hope that there are now enough natural predators?

Davesnave

Unsure. I've never seen a blackbird eat a slug and I'm fairly sure even the chickens won't tackle more than a tiny one. I've seen a toad eat a woodlouse, but never a slug. They seem to be like limpets; ideal bait for something, but in the case of the latter, only grumpy wrasse. Maybe if we could cross a wrasse with a chicken, we'd be onto something.

madjackslam

I think the weather earlier in the year - hot and dry - was the kind that slugs and snails really hate, so they were fairly inactive for the time of year. Useful when seedlings and new growth (which they normally wolf down) were emerging. Since the weather's turned wetter, I've noticed the blighters are back in force.

Grenage

The Blackbirds take delight in eating snails, but I've only seen them eat a slug on a single occasion (it spent about 10 minutes mashing it up on the garden path).

I suppose it probably was the weather - I look forward to the horde returning early next year.

Silvertabby

We have hedgehogs and hoglets !  We leave cat food out for them, and they thank us by gorging on snail pudding. 

silverwhistle

Davesnave said:

Maybe if we could cross a wrasse with a chicken, we'd be onto something.

It would certainly be pretty..