"Harold Walker" wrote in message
...

"Bob Smith (UK)" bob@nospamplease wrote in message
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From the new scientist back page:

Battery brainwave
IT SEEMS such a waste to throw away a battery because a digital camera
cannot draw enough power to light up the LCD screen, when you know there
is still some juice left in it to do...something. A UK company,
SnailAway, reckons it has found that use: most discarded batteries can
still give a snail or slug a small shock. Connect one to a closely spaced
pair of bare wires, and any slug or snail crossing the electric fence
will bridge the gap with its wet slimy body, feel the volts and turn
tail.
You are spared the guilt of waste, the plants are spared slugs, and
hedgehogs are spared lethal slug-poison.

( http://www.newscientist.com/backpage...mg18625051.800 )

Bob

Suspect whatever power is left in the cell would quickly disipate when in
contact with the moisture in the soil...H




I had a look on their web page. It is a bad description on NS website. It
seems to be two self adhesive copper strips that can only be used on
vertical surfaces (eg plant pots, or if your pots are raised on a paving
stone). Not much use on flower beds unless you build tiny walls around
them, and even then, the slugs could tunnel under.

They had an interesting article in NS a few years ago. A small robotic car
thing that went around catching slugs and snails, that made electricity to
power itself from the decaying bodies of it's victims. I am not a
subscriber, so cannot do a search to find the article.

Bob