In article , Karl P Anderson
wrote:

The best way to remove slugs from your garden is to get one of those
small yellow margarine tubs and put beer in it. Put it under your hosta
and the next morning it will be full of slugs. Best of all you can drink
what ever beer you don't use. You don't need to full the tub. Half way
will do. Try it, you'll like it.

Karl

I note you wisely don't repeat the false gardeners' "wisdom" that bear
kills slugs. Unless deep enough they crawl right back out so that they
MIGHT drown, beer doesn't kill slugs. But FRESH beer (they don't like it
flat) is the ideal bait to trap them alive (potentially the alcohol
content COULD kill slugs but it evaporates out of the beer in a matter of
minutes, so essentially they're wading into safe stuff).

If you have no use for a lot of drunken live slugs, you have to personally
take them out of the beer traps to kill them. They're edible by the way,
you can find cleaning instructions several places on-line. Mash 'em and
mix 'em with muffin mix, you'll get a day's worth of protein and you'll
shit pretty. It's the sort of recipe that makes me sad to be a vegetarian.
Slug muffins, mmmmmm.

Here's my article on iron phosphate and slugs:
http://www.paghat.com/slugcontrol.html

On the myth coffee grounds kill slugs:
http://www.paghat.com/coffeeslugs.html

partial repost of rec.gardens commentary on slugs and beer:

Near-beer also works as a good attractant, though without the alcohol
content it is all the more important that the trap be one they cannot
reach themselves out of. STALE near-beer let alone stale beer does not
attract them; the Univ. of Colorado study said it worked only one full day
& beer had to be changed every other day to keep working, but in Univ of
Ohio study they changed the bait only once a week (though they were not
killing the slugs, they were taking population measurements).

The study at the Universitiy of Colorado whimsically discovered that slugs
dislike some beers & just won't pay attention them, but rather liked
Michelob & Budweiser, & were totally enamored of Kingsbury Malt (which is
not alcoholic & did not kill many slugs, but the Colorado study used
professional traps deep enough to drown whatever climbed in). The
Universitiy of Ohio study wasn't so much to test control measures but to
take population & size/age & species statistics for a given area. A slug
hide-habitat was set over a sunken container of beer as the bait, &
changed weekly. The slugs were not killed. They accumulated in the habitat
above the beer where they were counted, size & ages recorded, & species
identified, then discarded. The traps did not kill many of the slugs that
hid comfortably in the habitats after being attracted by the beer. *In
this study beer was found to be a mediocre attractant overall, because
population estimates based on number of egg masses located was far greater
than could be shown with beer-traps.

But another study done inside greenouses found the attractant-rate of beer
to be very high in comparison to metaldhyde-based baits (unfortunately
they didn't compare to Slugo or EscarGo which is safer stuff). The study
was for four days only, performed in a series of greenhouses by the
Entymology Society of America, & they caught 300 slugs with beer but only
28 with metaldehyde bait. The Entymology Society did use the relatively
ineffective shallow pans flush with the ground.

Other findings from the whimsical Colorado study:

Slugs don't like flat beer at all, they want it fresh.
Slugs don't like Rainier Beer, Strohs, Pabst Blue Ribbon, Coors, or
Millers. Anyone who likes these beers lacks even the good sense of a slug.
Anheiser-Busch beers were across the board better liked, inducing one
soul to suggest a new brand, Slugweiser; but nothing equalled
non-alcoholic Kingsbury Malt in slug appeal.

Slugs don't like wine. Gallo Wine was slightly more appealing than
plain water, but not by much.

-paghat the ratgirl
--
visit my temperate gardening website:
http://www.paghat.com
visit my film reviews website:
http://www.weirdwildrealm.com