Come on then slugs...

This weekend I set about waging my (organic) war on the slugs who are treating my plot as a buffet bar...

After a quick trip to a local carboot sale we were loaded up with smelly, herby, slug repelling, slug-muncher attracting plants, yet more organic slug pellets and all the copper rings and tape we could carry.

Now all the slugs favourite cabbages are now inter-planted with smelly chives, yummy sage and pretty marigolds and surrounded by little shields of copper rings and organic slug repellent. I’ve also planted what felt like hundreds more calendulas and nasturtiums in the flowers beds surrounding the plot, alongside some huge lavender plants. I’m hoping this will do the trick...I’ll be back tonight to check.

I had a chat with our lovely allotment site manager Marina about the possibility of getting a pond constructed on our communal plot, in order to encourage frogs, toads and other slug lovers into the site- I even offered the boyf has manual labour. Unfortunately space is an issue and the council are not keen on unsafe structures like ponds. However, she has promised a workshop in July to encourage plot holders to construct small, shallow pools out of plastic basins on their own plots. I will definitely be doing this- and maybe moving some of the hundreds of tadpoles into it before the chooks get them!  I’m also going to get serious about a log pile and other wildlife attracting features...

Any tips?

Also I would be interested to hear if you encourage birds on your veg plot or scare them away? There's a real split at our allotments, people with bird feeders strung up everywhere next door to those who do everything to scare them away!