Trail of evidence on the seedtray
Judging from the trail of slime left on the soil, it was either a snail or a slug. An exhaustive search eventually exposed the culprit:
Monster slug hiding out amongst the toilet roll pots in which sweet pea seeds are planted.
I'm too squeamish to touch a slug, never mind squish it (though I can cope with touching a worm, now) so I carried the cardboard pot to the driveway and used a trowel to flick the slug off there. Hopefully a bird or hedgehog will find it and enjoy the meal.
I was getting ready to (read: vaguely thinking about) replace the eaten seedlings with new seeds, when I noticed they're still growing - look!
Zombie sunflower seedlings
Ghoulish headless seedlings, still relentlessly pushing upwards. These plant really are amazing!
Wow! That is a monster slug! We don't get them that big here - we've got a hedgehog who takes care of them long before they reach that size!
ReplyDeleteHi Tink :-)
ReplyDeleteWe've seen a hedgehog bimbling about, and I found a toad the other day - unfortunately I found him because I was in the middle of destroying his hiding place (a patch of ground elder) - and there's a pair of very bold blackbirds, but none of them managed to get to this big boy! Maybe your hedgehog could come over and give ours a few tips ;-)
Good for you for not squishing the slug. Apart from their nutritious qualities to other wildlife, they also provide a useful service in helping to break down dead vegetable matter. I appreciate that it's annoying that they also feel the need to do the same to precious plants, but just as a weed is only a plant in the wrong place, a slug in your seed-tray is simply a compost-maker who needs to be relocated. I stick mine on the compost heap.
ReplyDeletecj
I had wondered whether slugs might be similar to worms in their compost-munching abilities - thanks for confirming that, cj. I'd be a bit nervous about actually moving slugs to the heap(s), though, as there are precious plants nearby. Maybe I should be braver. I have heard that they prefer wilted leaves to growing ones, so all I have to do is keep up with the weeding to keep them well fed and off the veg patch.
ReplyDeleteYou can tell from the slime trail if it is a slug or a snail- slugs have a continual trail, snails have trails with gaps in them, because they move in a different way. (I really hope this is true- I 'knew" it was true when I was a kid, but someone might have been making it up!)
ReplyDelete