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Slug and Snail Trapper to the Rescue!
Question
Hi Martin, I had two rows of beautiful runner beans
and 75% of them have been snipped all at the same height of 5" from
the ground. What sort of animal does this? I have no rabbits in the
garden. Please let me know if you have an idea.
Regards
Marina
Answer
Dear Marina Many thanks for
your recent enquiry regarding the damage to your runner beans
– the exact same thing happened to our Kitchen Garden beans
last year and earlier this season! We were convinced that the
culprits during 2006 were mice (see our Kitchen Garden report on
the incident here as the
pea and bean netting was also severed, but this year the suspects
are slugs and snails as slime trails were noted at the crime scene
back in June.
Luckily, our beans
recovered and are now producing a heavy crop of pods. To reach this
stage however, To we had to religiously hand-pick off the snails,
apply nematodes (product code GPC-265) regularly and also laid down
some organic slug pellets (GPC-197) to help reduce the population
in what has been an awful year for these pests. The severed shoots
quickly re-sprouted from the leaf axis below but we still had to be
vigilant as the new shoots and leaves were growing – the
introduction of a slug and snail trapper (read more on
our latest Kitchen Garden update here) certainly helped in this
respect.
Unfortunately, it will
probably be too late for your beans now but this information will
hopefully be of help next year when you can prepare for the enemy
in good time!
Many thanks once again
for your message and good luck with your bean crop next
season.
Kind Regards Martin Fiddes |
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