Topic: Wood lice

[MaryM]

I seem to have a lot of these on my plot and they certainly seem very comfortable running amongst the potatoes-is there an organic way to deal with them?

[artichoke]

I would be interested too - they definitely eat my figs. Wherever a fig touches the wall (wall-trained, more or less, a bit hit and miss...) it is crawling with woodlice and chunks are missing and their frass is everywhere.

[Palustris]

Wood lice like damp dark conditions so remove any  leaf litter etc. However except in the greenhouse where there is a shortage of their normal food they do very little damage. Sorry Artichoke,  but it is not woodlice which damage your figs, they will move in and enjoy the dampness left behind and get the blame instead of slugs or snails or whatever. They live on dead and decaying material and as such in the compost heap they are primary converters into compost.

[mc55]

I've got lots of woodlice running around, so I'm glad to hear that they don't cause any mischief

[amphibian]

They live by their millions on my patio, they do no harm.

My daughter loves them.

[redimp]

They are family members with (and closely related to) crabs and apart from the occasional severing of a seedling, do nothing but good.

[artichoke]

Sorry, palustris, but I am not convinced. I have been growing figs for maybe 40 years, and I know the difference between bird strike, slugs, snails and woodlice. Woodlice love figs and carve their way into them without any sign of the other predators. Ripe figs split gently, and the woodlice are in there at once, and in my experience, ahead of the split as well.

[Jockthebear.]

I'm growing Swiss chard in large tubs. Many of the planted-out seedlings (about 1" tall) had their leaves cut off- they weren't eaten at all, just snipped and left lying beside the stump. It struck me that woodlice might be the culprits. Any comments, please?

[redimp]

Sound a bit like woodlouse damage that one but could be other things.  I tolerate them because they are so useful in other ways.  Some things are just crosses that you have to bare.

[philandjan]

We have nations of woodlice living in our compost bins!

They seem nice and polite. I think that they even enjoy the occasional man-made showers they get!

[Pigface51]

I have several grow bags, which (until recently) contained lettuce & rocket, prior to planting out...when the plants were moved out of the grow bags, I found a fair few woodlice (or cheesehogs as OH calls them - bless her)....there was no damage at all and they seemed to be more intersted in the decayed twiggy bits in the compost than in having a light salad.

Regarding figs, not knowing what they are like (other than "they exude a syrup" and that "they can roll"), do they have a stone in them?..if so, it might be that the snail-beasts-from-hell are munching the figs and the cheesehogs are after the stone.