Cutting a slug in half kills it and does not make two slugs. A simple means of detering the wee buggers from your plants is to spray the plants with cold, caffienated coffee.

Don't cut them, just salt them. Just make sure their not on your plants when you put the salt on them. Knock them off with a stick and salt away. Plus your hands won't be close to them. Good luck

For some unknown reason, I always made sure to smash (step on & grind hard) the entire slug when killing it; I don't know why. As for going on a killing spree, I would just pick them with a tweezer and deposit them in a cup of salt water, then throw the cup away...

Seedbeads, Tracey nj6, & Kathy5, I use all of your three menthods, although I stopped the salting when my husband objected to the insect torture. We have so many slugs that I have one bed where nothing has survived other than a lone daylily. Year after year I have tried various annuals. They are gorgeous until the slugs get them.

Kimmsr, I will gladly try your method of spraying with caffineated coffee!

Anyone know what annual flowers or perennials are slug resistant?

Mary

Cayuga2008 I agree with the insect torture, but when you have put money out for flowers and plants it kinda sucks. Lucky for me lately my 10 year old daughter is a nature/bug lover. She picks them up (yuck) and takes them elsewhere for me, so not salt torture this year.

Um, sorry, but when I went on a nightly slug hunt and came across 100, in one bed, enough was enough. Ever since then, I've been using Escar Go from Gardens Alive (organic & safe). I normally do 2 treatments, once in the spring and once in fall. It really did drop the slug population drastically. Last fall and this spring, I neglected to put the bait down, and have noticed an increase in the slug population. It can get quite expensive, ordering online, but it's always worth my business when I have a coupon and a rebate (thru an online rebate site, like Ebates or Fatwallet). I'm not affiliated with GA or Ebates or Fatwallet, just a happy customer/user...

Slug-Go or Escar-Go are found in the big box stores in my city. It is a safe, people and pet friendly slug and snail bait. Read the label carefully of any slug bait that you purchase to make certain that you don't use one of the products so dangerous to non-target animals such as birds, toads, etc. To say nothing of kids and pets.

Ditto what rhizo said, just wanted to add that there are several 'friendly' slug baits containing iron phosphate as their active ingredient, no reason to search out Escar Go specifically - you can buy by best price. Worry Free is one often in the weekend sale flyers here, and it wouldn't surprise me to find the chains have their own generic brands too, check labels.

You bait twice a year? I bait about 11 months out of 12, sometimes skipping January in this mild damp climate.

I don't see any mention of beer, so why don't you try that. Slugs love the stuff, and apparently get high and fall into the container(s) (partially buried into the ground) and drown. You can also buy copper strips to surround the garden (or plants) with. There's some kind of electrolysis problem that slugs have with the copper and they don't cross it.

I usually throw slugs and grubs (very hard) onto the walkway in hopes a bird will see them. After a sudden slug infestation 3 years ago (they were crawling up the houses!) I started putting ashes around the gardens. I haven't had much trouble from slugs since.
But those evil japanese beetles drive me to violence!!!

If your going to use the coffee spray, make sure you make double strength coffee. Normal brewed coffee is 0.5 - 0.7 % caffeine but the effect strength is 1.0 -2.0 % caffeine. Also, agricultural (not for swimming pools) diatomaceous earth placed around the plant or bed works. When working with this stuff, wear a mask, long sleeve and pants and gloves. The stuff in very small and sharp.

I don't have slugs yet. still too cold for them. From my experience they come out when it is warm enough. I use beer in a cup and dig it in the soil. They love beer then they drown in it.

If you create a good healthy garden you will have slugs, Roly Polys and Sowbugs, as well as probably earwigs and numerous other insects because you will be creating an environment thye like. However, that good healthy garden will also have a large population of beneficial insects that will eat these and help you control them.
You can place saucers of stale beer, slugs are drawn to the yeasty smell of stale beer and they will drown, happily.
You can spend a lot of money on the Iron Phosphate baits.
You can spend a lot of money on copper wire, tape, etc.
Mostly what I see is slug damage where there is little organic matter for them to feed on, where there is ample quantities of organic matter there is little slug damage to plants even when the population is relatively high.

Coffee grinds works a charm. Just sprinkle it over your garden bed to get rid of slugs and snails.