Foxgloves and Slugs!

[Teo]

Hello!
I lovingly planted and cared for at least 100 Foxglove seeds a few years ago and last year they grew so tall and bloomed in all their majestic glory. Then came the slugs. The plant leaves were completely demolished. They were getting watered from spraying heads and I'm wondering if soaker hoses would attract fewer slugs, maybe creating less moisture in the air??? I was so heartbroken at the time that I eventually pulled them all out feeling sure that I wouldn't be able to solve the problem. And now of course I regret having done this! But I want to try again armed with more information for success. Any thoughts or advice would be hugely appreciated!!

 

[Chuck]

The easiest and maybe the best thing for slugs and snails is a product called Sluggo. It is made from iron phosphate and is organic, Harmless to people and pets plus it is also a micronutrient. Just sprinkle it around the base of the plants and around your garden. If you have pillbugs too then Sluggo Plus works very well for them. The only difference between them is the Sluggo Plus has spinosad in it, which is also organic and harmless to people and pets.

 

[Teo]

Thank you Chuck! I've used Sluggo in the past without much luck. Maybe I'm using it incorrectly?

 

[Chuck]

Thank you Chuck! I've used Sluggo in the past without much luck. Maybe I'm using it incorrectly?

If a slug or snail eats it he is dead. Perhaps you spread it too thin? Iron phosphate is used by all of slug killing products. Decades ago all we had was a product that contained metaldehyde. It worked but this stuff is nasty, poison to pets and people if ingested. And it took 2 or 3 days before it killed although they did slow their eating drastically. You can still get it from Southern Ag. Another way to get rid of them is with slug nematodes which you can get online. I have never used slug nematodes but I do use other nematodes for fireants, fleas and ticks and they work extremely well. When I lived in Houston decades ago we didn't have anything but the metaldehyde so I used beer traps and coffee grounds. I am sure that not using the sprinkler would help a lot but I have had too much good luck with snails using Sluggo. I don't have slugs where I live now but I do have a lot of snails. Sluggo does have an expiration date but I don't remember what it is. I do know that you have to reapply it but I never had to.

 

[Teo]

Thank you for the further info. I always poured out plenty. I read once that if you see one even one slug, that means you've already fallen way behind the problem, rather than ontop of it. So I think that I have always addressed the problem way past the time when I could have gotten things under control. I'm going to revisit the Sluggo now, and just try and use it way way earlier like before I notice any slug.

 

[Eeilee]

I use sluggo plus and sprinkle cinnamon liberally around my in ground plants. Slugs, ants and gnats all hate crawling or flying around cinnamon. As a bonus the cinnamon works as an anti fungal in the soil.

 

[Teo]

I use sluggo plus and sprinkle cinnamon liberally around my in ground plants. Slugs, ants and gnats all hate crawling or flying around cinnamon. As a bonus the cinnamon works as an anti fungal in the soil.

CINNAMON!!! I’m eager to try it! Thank you!!

 

[NigelJ]

Digitalis purpurea is typically biennial , so year one germinates and grows, year two flowers produces seed and dies.. Slugs eating leaves after flowering is not surprising as they are simply disposing of waste, which is what they do.
As for slugs you can get nematodes to deal with those.
You can get seed for a number of perennial foxgloves that will reflower for several summers, for example D lutea, D ferruginae, D lanata and D obscura.