Topic: Beer Traps

[Marymary]

After seeing a beer trap being emptied on Grow Your Own last night I think I will give them a miss - really made me feel ill & I'm not usually squeamish.  :)

[kt.]

Never seen or heard of them till last night. Gonna put some in this year. How many do you use and where is best cos slugs are everywhere..... Dont want to waste too much beer if you know what i mean ;D

[MrsKP]

i put traps out regularly and just as regularly forget to look in them !

i currently have 12 stacked in the shed (traps that is, not slugs).

tell me why we don't just sling them in the compost bin to munch their way through there ?  is it just cos we hate slugs so much that death brings out our bad sides ?  8)

[cornykev]

Nice idea Saddad with the slops, I will have to go on a pub crawl today, just for surveying reasons you understand. No way them slugs are drinking my stella. ;D ;D ;D ;D ;D

[saddad]

and it gives you an excuse to be in the pub at closing time... assuming they do "close" nowadays... they usually measure the slops before chucking them, something to do with the excise duty...
 ;D

[cornykev]

Chucking them yer right, they top up the pints of the most drunken customers, that gets rid of the slops, take a few pints for themselves count them as the slops ,job done. :o :o ;D ;D :-X

[John_H]

I tried beer traps for a while - using short bits of drain pipe sunk into the soil to put the base of the cups in. I did get some slugs but it was a bit of a chore, cleaning the cups and getting rid of the slime.

My problem with this method was that the beer acts as an attractant to the slugs, so I figured that as well as killing the slugs in very close proximity, it would also encourage a fresh bunch in from nextdoor plots.

I'm using more vengeful methods now - I have removed the planks which I used to use to prop up the sides of my raised beds and I leave them on the ground next to each bed (which creates temporary daytime refuges for slugs, slow worms, ground beetles etc) and I turn these over each time I visit the plot. I let the ground beetles and the slow worms carry on doing their own thing and just single out the slugs for a quick death with a small pair of scissors!

[cornykev]

That's pure evil :o John, I can see that we are going to get on.    ;D ;D

[MrsKP]

I must admit to having taken a pair of scissors to one before.  I nearly threw up and haven't repeated it since.  Salt is equally not for the squeamish !

 :-X

[saddad]

I just use the boot and a hard place method. A walk with a torch after dark on a warm June evening is ideal.... once got over 500 slugs and snails... it did take about two hours!
 ;D

[Marymary]

I usually feed them to my chickens but even they turn their beaks up at the big orange ones!