Slugs are composters. I had many untill I began using sluggo. No more 8" bananna slugs on the front door in the morning! ;)

LOL, michelelc when you say large, are you talking about an inch or a foot? Here are the little ones.

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Here are the big ones (this is an 8-incher)

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But I'm not sure it matters. If you get some ammonium sulfate (a common fertilizer but also a SALT) and scatter some around where the slugs are, they cannot help but die of salt poisoning. For about $3 you should be able to get a life time supply of ammonium sulfate. Oh and I would not put this fertilizer into the compost. I would use up all the compost in the garden and put the ammonium sulfate in the garden with the compost. Then start new compost piles with an ammonium sulfate barrier around the bins.

In any garden with adequate levels of organic matter in the soil and where soils are well mulched slugs will be a problem. While they will get into compost they are not there for much good and they will not be in a working compost pile because that will simply be too hot for them. There are many strategies for handling slugs but what I have found over the years is if you provide enough food for them they will, generally, leave the things you want alone and you will have a lot of gigantic toads from eating as many as the toads want.

Dchall,

It looks like you have your slugs -n- snails in a wooden salad bowl. PLEASE tell us you don't plan on making a gourmet meal of those gross gastropods!

Shudder

Rain (who hates them, but who can probably out do about all of you when it comes to slug count, more's the pity)

Wow, those are a lot of slugs, ick! Most of the slugs in my compost bin are maybe 4-8", I don't get close enough to measure! And, I don't have that many :)
Sounds like I should mix some sluggo or ammonium sulfate in the compost before I spread it in the garden and then build a barrier to prevent more slugs from coming. I always thought they were helping the compost, good to know that they're not. I'm probably not very precise in keeping the temp. hot enough to drive them away, either. I just add stuff and wait till it decomposes.
As far as toads, I'm in a pretty subburban area and doubt I'll see any toads around.
Thanks for all the advice.

I have not had snails or slugs for at least 10 years. That was the last time I used ammonium sulfate on them. Toads and ammonium sulfate do not get along. I had toads when I stopped using the chemicals and before I got 3 cats. Since the cats my natural garden predators have left me.

4-8 inches?? Guh-ROSS! I thought mendopete was joking so I was just going a long with it. I first saw banana slugs on the beach in Oregon a few decades ago. That was a rude awakening. But surely there is a way to fillet them or put them on a spit in the bbq. heh, heh

In a couple of weeks, when things warm a bit more, we will be hearing the "spring Peepers" calling, lots of them, toads. These wee critters live in the city, in the densely populated suburbs, and in rural areas, except where people put down poisons that kill them off, or that kill off their food sources, or were people destroy the very minimal habitat (someplace fairly moist) they need.
The lack of presence of toads indicates a serious human habitat problem.

I'd welcome some toads happily into my yard, but I've never seen any. Would it be bad to "import" one home if I happen to find one somewhere else? I wouldn't want to take something out of it's natural habitat if it wouldn't like my garden. My mom lives in North Carolina in a more wooded area and she said she's just started hearing the "spring peepers". I'm jealous!

I too was wondering if the 8" long banana slugs are edible.. Where is Andrew Zimmern when you need him?

Who is Andrew Zimmern? Is he akin to Euell Gibbons ("Ever eat a pine tree? Many parts are edible!")?

Rain

I need to go get a cool cloth for my forehead after that picture of the bowl

I read someone's theory once that a garden covered with finished compost with its neutral pH would not be attractive to slugs, and their numbers would be low. I haven't yet found that to be the case.

Greetings from Slug Country!

There are a lot of different climates and ecosystems in the US and Canada. Some have native toads and some do not and some have them, but in very low numbers. If you have them around, they will help control slugs, as will garter snakes.

I don't have either in natuarally in large numbers in my region and I also have lots of cats and people who use chemicals in my neighborhood which reduce the numbers further and I can't do anything about it.

I have tried many, many different methods to control slugs, but the one that works best for me is Sluggo (or other iron phosphate products). Do NOT mix it into compost, that will make it useless. Just sprinkle it very, very lightly on the soil surface. The pacakge shows a picture of an application rate and I have found it works well if you apply it even less than that. YMMV. Apply it when rain isn't expected because it doesn't work after it gets wet.

I would apply it around your compost bins, and then around your garden every two or three weeks. I pinch just two or three pellets at a time and toss them here and there throughout the yard. Regular, very light applications work best. Heavy applications once a season will not work at all.

Thank you, again! The description of how you use the sluggo is very helpful!

dchall,
my dear garden helper old hen Silver would be so happy to see your bowl. She works hard on cleaning my garden but i still find slugs under rocks and so on.

I find Sluggo effective, too.

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I just dispatched a slug that you could cut into steaks.

Had to use the axe.

:P