THE UNTAMED GARDENER: No silver bullets for slugs

The tiny flock of young lambs are no longer skittish. They don’t dart from passing traffic like they did a few weeks ago, half-alarmed, half-playful. They are maturing in sync, with nature as Spring turns to Summer. Soon, they will hardly notice passing traffic. Perhaps one will lift her head for a moment to gaze around with mild interest, and then, move swiftly back to the work at hand.

In the evening, late, I go outside and am met by an eerie sound. This must be one of the most unusual bird sounds, something like a bleating goat. The ‘drumming’, sound originates from stiff tail feathers that vibrate as the bird performs its diving display flight to attract females. Or sometimes as a warning sound, as to my interruption. Snipe is rarely seen; it will wait in situ and only fly away at the last minute when approached. Sadly, even though snipe is on red list of endangered species, they are still seen as a game bird. It is where we get the name ‘sniper’ from. A visiting wader, who arrives to breed in our wetlands, both in summer and winter.

Nature cannot be separated from us, that is a given. It is reflected on every surface of life in our stories and song. In the translation of the eighth century anonymous love poem Donal Óg, is the line; “the snipe was speaking of you in her deep marsh.” Poetry, language, food, art, and architecture are teaming with nature metaphors. In technological design it is known as: biomimicry.

Nature is the biggest resource for modern medicine as it was our only pharmacy in the past. Plants containing salicylic acid, such as willow and birch, were used as an anti-inflammatories and pain killers. Eventually this was chemically synthesised into Aspirin. Willow water was, at one stage, to be found in all the supermarkets. Whatever your stance, it makes sense to use all our resources and intelligence to protect it. As words like curlew, and newt are culled from dictionaries to make way for cash grab, and nepo baby respectively.

There is a collective sigh of relief as aquafers below ground and the rain barrels of community gardens are filling across the country. Farmer and gardener alike are happy, for a while. The glasshouse is pausing too, albeit briefly. Almost all the seedlings are outside hardening off before they are planted. If they were to go immediately into the soil from the greenhouse, their tender leaves and stems would only make a lovely meal for slugs, from whom we have had a long respite.

How come? Because of the dry weather, slugs lose water as they move, and they need moist soil on which to do their ‘dirty work’. My motto is: Know your enemy. Organic gardeners use what is know as ‘cultural control’ to protect plants from predators? Now that’s confusing, plant eating species are herbivores. Anyway, let’s just say that there are many types of slugs. I don’t think that they intend to kill plants, they are just hungry. I guess. In science speak, slugs belong to the class - Gastropod(a) - ie, stomach foot. They usually go for the soft, gooey stuff that they can digest easily with their, give or take 2,000–8,000 teeth! There are of course other slugs with carnivorous callings, such as the leopard slug, who will, at a push eat a live slug, Ugh! Of the 38 species in Ireland, only a handful are a garden menace. The trouble starts when that handful become an army of stomach-foot soldiers.

I have tried everything humanely possible. From, nightly collection with a flashlight, slug traps and hotels, to copper tape and tools. Coffee grinds, decoys, eggshells, sheep’s fleece and human hair, the list is lengthy. I’m starting to believe that Cavan snails have magical properties that defy all the above. Sure, they even have a homing instinct for heaven’s sake. Truly though, these methods work on ordinary slug numbers, but en masse, when the tipping point has been reached and they start working together nothing can stop them. Except for one thing... a hedgehog.

Last year do you remember how it rained and rained? One wet evening, something outside was driving the dog to distraction, and I went out to have a look. Then, like a boar hunting truffles, he sniffed her out. So, we now have a new resident in the garden. Soon I noticed the effect on the plants. Far less decapitated flowers and shredded leaves. The hedgehog was cleaning up! This massive reduction in the slug population has given me a renewed confidence to try growing slug favourites like Dahlias. Now that it’s raining again, she is out there having a feast!