shannie wrote:

Thanks Chris,
I bought some pelletts yesterday morning that are purported to be safe
around pets, chickens etc, but after my exp with the cats I didn't want to
use them, however as it happens I do have some slate lying around, so if the
need arises I shall put some pelletts under the slate, perhaps raised a
little on a small stonefor access and see how that goes, I imagine the
snails would love it if its nice warm and dark with a feast inside,I hope
not to have to use them, Im going to try the beer and see how that goes

Beer works but is messy, so do hob nail boots after dark. There are slug
pellets
with a specific molluscide which are far less toxic to mammals and birds
than
they are to slugs and snails, but even so they are still best off
covered. The
most common sort will poison anything that eats them.

The other way safe for your chickens is to use the gruesome but natural
parasitic nematode method of control. That is incredibly specific and
lethal
only to the target species.

"Cerumen" wrote in message
...

At the risk of being called pedantic I only said they would kill anything
that ate them and didn't comment on the possibility or otherwise of
anything other than slugs/snails so doing. Personally I don't use slug
pellets but if I did I would do as I do with rat bait (also blue grains)
and lay it in such a way that hens could not get to it.

I largely agree - and the cover tends to attract them to the bait.

Regards,
Martin Brown