I have a zillion small white snails invading my fruit trees. The type that you see attached to fence posts. My problem is how do I deal with them without using a ton of snail bait? They are eating every leaf off of my citrus trees. The trees are only a year old so can't cope with being eaten. At the momment getting ducks to eat them isn't an option. Later I am planning on getting ducks but in the mean time I need to protect my baby trees
dusting with diatomaceous earth may help for those already on the plants. may need some oil based spray first to get it to stick. vegetable oil. gonna have to hit all surfaces so this sounds pretty time intensive... how many can you pick off by hand? are they going up the stem/trunk? you may be able to stop them by using a thick grease layer around the trunk if your temps aren't too high that would melt the grease. or maybe wax would hold up better. not sure, i've not had to deal with this issue before... i have also heard about using foil or copper strips to keep slugs off but i'm not sure how well that would work for the sized creatures you are facing.
The idea of greasing the trunk appeals to me but I wonder if this could harm the tree. So maybe I could wrap a protective layer around the tree, tight enough that the snails can't get under it and then grease that layer. I'm assuming the grease layer would have to be wider than the snails are long and that would be enough. I'll give this a go and see how it works. It won't work on a couple of the trees that are really bushes and have lots of branches that touch the ground but the orange tree that is the one the snails are really hammering is just one trunk so I will try it on that one Thanks for the idea
Are they the same white snails in this thread? https://permaculturenews.org/forums/index.php?threads/hundreds-of-little-white-snails.14554/
Yes those are the little B's They seem to be everywhere and don't only come out when it rains (like garden snails)
tried the grease. Didn't slow the "B" down at all. This morning I was up early enough to go and watch as one happily slid over 3 inches of thick grease and had to pick several of his mates off of higher up. Oh well it was worth a try.
No i guess that will be my next try but I have read that it doesn't work. Have you used it and had any good results?
Have you got access to wood ash? A nice thick layer of that on the ground around the trees should stop the slimy lil buggers. Also many fruit trees appreciate the ash too so there's at least two uses. Good luck.
Thanks. At the moment i have a pile of ash and charcoal from a burn I did I will move that over and see if it keeps the "slippery little suckers" off my trees
We had this problem last year. Planted some capers and hundreds of those snails were eating them to the ground. We used a copper sulphate solution applied to the underside of the rim of an old plant pot. We cut the bottom off the pot and placed it over the plant and dug it down into the ground about 2cm. Not a single snail made it past. We also used ash and that worked for a short while. I’ve attached a picture of one of the caper bushes one year later with the pot still in place.
There is also the beer in a jar at ground level, so they can crawl in. I have found snails love the beer, and then drown themselves. From the sound of your problem, I think you might need a brewery though, best of luck with your problem.