Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Snow in Summer attack of the Cherry Slug

Every year the little varmints arrive, sliding around looking gross, turning our lush green tree leaves brown and eventually causing them to drop. It starts on our enormous pear, then moves to the cherry, but this year they are also on the plums, quince, and nashi. 
Cherry or Pear Slugs are not a welcome guest at our home.

One of the control methods I have read about is dusting them with baking flour (ash and lime can also have similar results).  

The kids were armed with 1/2  kilo plain flour and sent to work. 


 





Food fight! Flour throwing is really good fun, especially with a foe that can't defend itself.
Of course the food obsessed little Bowerbird had to try eating some, and there was much coating of clothing in the process. The trees looked rather magical all dusted in white.

The following day there were many dead slugs, although clearly many in the land of the living. Any that were properly coated were dead but this is hard to achieve over such a big area. I would recommend the treatment though, as it is simple and a fun activity for the kids, and the pest have definately been slowed down. These photos were taken just before xmas (when days were blissfully cooler than the current heat wave) and I think a follow up treatment would be beneficial.

Anyone had success in getting rid of Cherry or pear Slugs? - any tips would be warmly welcomed.

5 comments:

  1. It sure does look like a fun activity to get the kids to do:) I was wondering when you did this looking at the warm clothing, here's to a cool change not sure when we'll get one up here in Queensland we're just starting out heat wave :(

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  2. What fun for the kids...i had never heard of that solution...going to give it a try! I am really over all the pests we have here in the garden at the moment....must be the hot weather and humidity i think but i am fighting a losing battle i fear!Love the pics!!

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  3. Certainly a less dangerous pesticide than most! Maybe you could develop a sort of puffer / spray-gun that delivers the flour more efficiently?

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  4. Great way to get the kids involved in the garden. Looks like fun - though sorry to hear of your regular fruit tree invasion!

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  5. If you have ash available it might be a better choice than flour as it would act as fertiliser for the tree too! If there was a way of getting some chooks to scratch underneath the tree in winter they would eat the larvae hiding there.
    http://greenharvest.com.au/PestControlOrganic/Information/PearAndCherrySlugControl.html

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In the spring, at the end of the day, you should smell like dirt.
Margaret Atwood

“She turned to the sunlight
And shook her yellow head,
And whispered to her neighbour:
"Winter is dead.”
― A.A. Milne, When We Were Very Young