Fighting snails - 4 crucial tips for eating your own vegetables

As a child I admired snails

On my way to school, I saw a bush teeming with snails. I don't remember much about kindergarten, but it's a vivid memory. I vividly remember that as a child, I loved snails. The shell snails, in particular, had beautiful colors and curves. I was also fascinated by the idea that an animal carried its own shell on its back. They could hide in it when in danger; my childhood imagination ran wild. The antennae that swayed back and forth also made me pause every day; I'd tap them to make the snails retract. Fighting snails was the furthest thing from my mind.

Years later I had a completely different image of snails

About 30 years later, I encountered snails again. I'd started a small vegetable garden at the back of the yard where the grass was ruined because I'd stored some firewood. I'd turned over the bare patch with a pitchfork and planted some plants. It was wonderful to grow my own food just 20 steps from my kitchen—bliss, isn't it? Until that one morning I went to check my garden and found my lettuce and spinach completely gone. And there were huge holes in the cauliflower . It didn't take long before I could pinpoint the culprit. The slime trails on the (leftover) leaves spoke for themselves.

What happened that admiring snails became fighting snails?

How could it be that the snails I also admired were such demons? As a toddler, I'd spent hours standing by the bush, watching the snails. Picking them up and moving them from branch to branch like some kind of pet. And since I have a vegetable garden, I put my foot on it, scatter snail pellets , send my chickens there... What had happened? I'd changed something. I'd removed the pile of firewood with a tarp. I'd moved a Disneyland for snails. Then I cleared the remaining grass, and to top it all off, I planted vegetables in neat rows on bare earth. Unaware that in that earth and around that space, those snails and their snail eggs were still present. I don't need to explain the result.

The problem wasn't the snails but my upbringing

A bit of a strange subtitle, but if you think about it, you see so many examples around you of how humans intervene to turn a natural situation to their advantage or to rectify a threat or a bad situation. Take the rainforest, for example, where forests are being cut down to create agricultural land. Or a common cold needs to be treated as quickly as possible. Throat lozenges, pills, syrup... we have to intervene to restore something or turn it to our advantage. How we do that and what the consequences are isn't so important. Correcting a bad situation or changing a natural situation to our advantage is ingrained in us. And in my vegetable garden, I first "broken a natural situation" to turn it to my advantage. I wasn't aware of it. To me, it was a pile of wood; to those snails, a very interesting habitat. Then I wanted to rectify a "bad situation" (at least, to me, it was bad) because those snails had no right to eat my vegetables—what were they thinking? And I went to war.

Work preventively if possible, combat snails if there is no other option.

Making peace with snails

Just like in my previous article about controlling horsetail , we need to find some kind of compromise with snails. They're an essential part of nature, they're also very useful, and they don't really target your vegetables. But if nothing else is available, they can wreak havoc on vegetables being grown. In the remainder of this chapter, we'll try to understand them better so we can adapt. And yes, a snail will die here and there. But with a smart approach, that number won't be many.

What do snails eat?

As mentioned before, snails aren't particularly keen on your seedlings, young plants, or fruit. They have to work much harder to eat those things than, say, a piece of rotting wood, a mushroom, or plant debris. They like to eat things that are breaking down. For them, that's sliced ​​bread, while our vegetable garden plants are unsliced. But if you're hungry, that naturally doesn't matter, and you'll also start eating the unsliced ​​bread.

The internet is full of tips on how to combat snails when it's too late

When do people start looking for information about snails? Just when the garden has been taken over by our slimy friends and there's practically no solution left. Then we start putting out beer, which we're actually buying to drink ourselves, to catch snails. Or we go catching snails at dusk with a torch on our heads, or we stick copper tape all over the vegetable garden... I find all of that admirable, but it's really too late. You should never let it become unbalanced in your garden.

Apply the 4 measures for little to no snail damage

1. Release chickens or ducks into the garden to control snails

My chickens have been in the vegetable garden since October (after my grape harvest). In those five to six months, they've eaten quite a few snails and snail eggs. My large vegetable garden covers 350 square meters. I also have four chickens. These chickens spend a good portion of the day scratching around for food. They meticulously comb the entire garden, leaving no spot untouched. The only thing you need to do is put some wire or mesh around your winter vegetables. If you still have parsnips, celeriac, carrots, winter onions, winter garlic, winter cabbage, broad beans, etc., or other crops, screen them off from the chickens. It takes half a day to fence everything off, and then the chickens can start their big feeding frenzy. And all the chickens produce is manure. I put the chickens back in their run when February becomes March, so the manure can soak into the soil a bit and become less potent. Once the chickens are back in their coop, it's time to mulch, because bare soil, moisture, sun and warmer temperatures guarantee a lot of squeaky weeds.

2. Controlling snails: Create a perimeter for snails

My vegetable garden borders on one side of a busy road with two sections, and a beech hedge separates it from the verge. On the other side, there's a simple grass path, one and a half meters long. This grass path isn't maintained by the city, so the grass grows tall. Consequently, many snails live on both sides. In March/April, I create a barrier between the busy road and the street where my vegetable garden is located. I mainly use snail pellets for this; they work best. People who say snail pellets don't work often let it get too far and only start taking action when the snails are in full swing. You can also create a barrier with copper tape, coffee grounds, or eggshells, but that's not very effective. In large vegetable gardens, you'd have to eat eggs every day to have enough eggshells to create the barrier.

3. Creating a habitat for natural enemies of snails

If someone else can do it for you, it's even better, right? There are other creatures in the vegetable garden that are only too happy with snails. Here's a list of natural predators for snails:

• Hedgehogs
• Frogs
• Toads
• Songbirds
• Moles
• Hay wagons
• Snakes and lizards (a bit more difficult in our region)
• Centipedes
• Salamanders
• Slow worm
• Shrews
• fireflies

You can attract these animals by creating a compost pile, placing a pile of branches in the vegetable garden, sowing a wildflower mix, or creating a pond or water feature. In short, a natural vegetable garden is also the solution.

4. Introduce nematodes into your soil to combat snails

In spring, you can release tiny creatures into your vegetable garden that pierce and eventually kill slugs. These are nematodes. With the product No-slug , you introduce millions of nematodes into your garden. For the first two weeks after application, the soil must remain moist so the nematodes can establish themselves in your garden. The nematodes are also effective against all kinds of larvae that are laid at the base of your plants.

Finally

My childish admiration for snails is unfortunately gone. But my hatred has also diminished considerably. We live together in my vegetable garden. They live on the other side of the wire fence or beech hedge, and I live on the side of my garden. So remember that you have to combat snails year-round, and certainly not just when they're present, because then it's too late. You can do something about them in every season. Winter (chickens or ducks), autumn (creating a habitat for natural enemies), and in spring and summer you can maintain the perimeter and introduce nematodes into the soil. If you found this article valuable, share it with your friends, within your gardening club, or others. You can support this site by purchasing your vegetable garden supplies in our online store . Moestuinweetjes stands for sustainable quality, fast delivery, personal contact, and competitive prices. A 4.9 out of 5 rating based on more than 100 reviews—that's not something you get for free. See you later, Tom