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Home made Slug/snail bait: Excellent results.

Posted by ju1234 (8 Dallas TX) (My Page) on
Thu, Jun 26, 14 at 21:54

Finally I decided that I have to do something about them. They just snip off the flowers on my plants. If a vine had 8 flowers, like half have been snipped off.

I went to store. There are two types of baits. One has poison and the other with "iron phosphate. Pricy. $10 for a 2 lb bag. Active ingredient only iron phosphate. So I decided to make my own.

I figured Iron sulfate should be as good and it is cheap. 2 table spoons of flour, 1 teaspoon of Ironite, enough water to make it like a very soft toothpaste. I put two drops of "neem oil + pyrethrin" (I know it is insecticide but still natural). I cut some pieces of plastic cups. Poured a little bit of that grey black bait in those rounded plastics and set them out.

Surprise: each one of those stations had at least 4-5 small snails on it dead or almost dead. Their mouth ends were black having gorged on this stuff. I did not see any big ones. My theory about the big ones is that after gorging they are still strong enough to crawl away and die elsewhere in hiding. I think this stuff has been very successful. I will see if it continues to work over the next few days.

I had set out beer traps also at the same time. Some of them (no all) had 1-2 bigger ones in them.


Follow-Up Postings:

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RE: Home made Slug/snail bait: Excellent results.

Interesting. After reading more about sluggo around a year ago, I decided to stop using it. Keep us posted!

--McKenzie


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RE: Home made Slug/snail bait: Excellent results.

I'd be tempted to make the paste using beer instead of water.


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RE: Home made Slug/snail bait: Excellent results.

  • Posted by ju1234 (8 Dallas TX) (My Page) on
    Fri, Jun 27, 14 at 19:24

Beer for making paste is perhaps good idea. However what I have read here the beer has to be fresh to work. Which means in the paste it may not work. I am leaving the paste out there till it is washed away by rain.


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RE: Home made Slug/snail bait: Excellent results.

mckenziek- what's up about Sluggo????? Nancy


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RE: Home made Slug/snail bait: Excellent results.

That issue (rain) is why ferric phosphate is used. It is practically insoluble in water, where iron sulfate is very soluble.


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RE: Home made Slug/snail bait: UPDATE

  • Posted by ju1234 (8 Dallas TX) (My Page) on
    Sat, Jun 28, 14 at 17:29

Last night added new bait (old stuff had dried from sun). Checked it in morning. Hardly any SS. No new damage on plants either. I guess that one night of bait eradicated them until more invade from the neighboring areas. I guess once a week application would perhaps be more appropriate to keep them in check.


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