On Wed, 20 Feb 2013 18:45:31 +0000, The Original Jake
wrote:

On Wed, 20 Feb 2013 10:18:36 -0800 (PST), wrote:

On Wednesday, February 20, 2013 9:51:49 AM UTC, Fuschia wrote:
On Tue, 19 Feb 2013 10:40:46 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Tuesday, February 19, 2013 11:40:36 AM UTC, Fuschia wrote:
On Mon, 18 Feb 2013 11:46:13 -0800 (PST), wrote:
On Saturday, February 16, 2013 11:57:26 PM UTC, wrote:

Thanks everyone. a ring on the ground probably won't work. I'll probably use a slip of wet & dry sandpaper and a rubber band.

A ring on the ground certainly *does* work, very effectively.

When there are other easy short paths for the slugs to get onto the plants?

I'm speaking from several years of successful use, and that of other
more experienced gardeners who taught me.
But then I listen to advice, rather than asking and then dismissing
it.

So you stand by your assertion that even when the slugs & snails are regularly climbing & traversing the wall the plant's against, copper wire on the ground will still stop them reaching the plant. Well done. There's also a lot of animal digging there, things on the ground don't stay in place long. Aand in the case of wire even if it did stay in place, some of the soil under it wouldnt, and some of the wire would get buried.

And you wonder why I have doubts!

It would have helped if you had said at the outset that the plants
were against a wall and that there was animal digging in the area.
Your rather esoteric reference to "other easy short paths" came late
in the thread and even that didn't hint at digging. And walls are not
necessarily easy short paths. You were given answers on the basis of
the information you supplied.

Fuschia did not make the assertion that you suggest because, as for
the rest of us, knowledge of the wall and digging was absent.

I suggest the use of "sorry" would be appropriate.

Thanks Jake.
I find it strange that the OP should consider putting either "a little
piece of copper wire round a plant's stem" or "a slip of wet & dry
sandpaper and a rubber band" when s/he knew all along (unlike us) that
the wall would equally provide a bypass for these measures as it would
for a ring around the base.