Nematodes in terrarium to control slugs

[MWilko86]

Hiya

It hasn't got to a stage to cause worry at the moment as I've only seen one or two slugs on sides of the terrarium, some eggs (which were chucked out of the window) and the odd young sliding around. There doesn't seem to be any damage caused to the neps in the terrarium aside from the odd notch in a couple of leaves and it has only been the boston fern that got munched which has now bounced back.

Would it be an idea to let loose some nematodes into my bio-active setup to prevent a possible slug problem? If not, is it possible that there is another way without disturbing the whole setup and harming the clean up crew?

Mike

[Karsty]

Hey MWilko,

I've been a professional gardener for 20 years, so have spent a long time trying to deal with slugs/snails. I'm not an expert on it, but the nematodes seems like a great idea. They work really well on slugs in moist environments, and I think they die out when the slugs die off. You may also consider a few organic slug pellets? The only thing in them is ferric phosphate. The only thing about them is, the slug has to  prefer the slug pellet over whatever else is on the menu.

Something I have just learnt - the tiny brown/black flat-spiral shelled snails you sometimes find do not feed on our valued plants. They may feed on algae or even be carnivorous. That's a relief, because a number of them appear on my tree fern every night!

[Hannahraptor]

Sounds like a good idea to me too. It does make me smile though. Especially as I keep giant African land snails and nematodes are one of my worse nightmares!