Slugs & Caterpillars
Three days ago people were commenting on how lovely our plants were, with no holes from slugs or caterpillars in any of the leaves. I guess there were slugs and cabbage worms nearby that heard them talking about this unblemished salad bar because they all showed up at once.
This is bad for the cabbage and broccoli…but the chickens are quite happy about it. I’ve spent more than a couple hours pulling these pests off the plants and handing them over to the chickens. Now when I walk toward the door of the run I am greeted with eager little faces (usually the Buckeyes are first in line) which is cute…but we’re going to have to do more because I just don’t have time to pick all of these off the plants one at a time.
Got Slugs?
I made a mixture of Bronner’s soap and water and sprayed all the leaves last night. This did seem to help as I couldn’t find one single caterpillar this morning…but this won’t (and didn’t) deter slugs. We are going to try the drown-them-with-beer method and the trap-them-in-a-melon-rind method because those are easier that the other deterrents we know about: surrounding all the plants with either copper foil or diatomaceous earth.
Diatomaceous earth is also good for ridding yards of fleas, so just in case you have that infestation, you could invest in some of that ancient mineral mixture. Good luck with other methods, too. (Have Nancy’s ducks discovered the slugs and catties on your plants, or are they too happy from gleaning from their own garden?)