While some gardening sites recommend chamomile as a slug proof plant and others have people asking what could be causing the holes in the chamomile’s leaves and being told it’s definitely slugs. This leaves many gardeners with questions. Questions like do slugs actually eat chamomile? Or is chamomile a plant that slugs won’t touch?
Will Slugs Eat Chamomile?
The truth is slugs will eat chamomile, they aren’t too picky when it comes to what they eat. After all, slugs are good for getting rid of dead stuff in your garden.
Sure you can plant some herbs that have heavily fragranced foliage, such as rosemary, that slugs won’t eat. But the fact remains that most of what you plant in the garden is going to be tempting to slugs at some point during the growing season.
Do Slugs Eat Mint?
How To Stop Slugs From Eating Your Chamomile
Controlling slugs is something every gardener is going to have to do at some point. Luckily there are some things you can try to use to help curb their population.
Torchlight Searches
Not as drastic as it sounds. It might feel like you are getting your pitchfork and torch out to conquer the slugs that have been wreaking havoc on your chamomile plants. In reality, you are just armed with a flashlight and a container such as a bucket. Go out after the sun has gone down or before it comes up and use your flashlight to search around where your chamomile plants are and find slugs. Pick them up and put them in your bucket.
You have several options with the bucket. If you have chickens, you can always give the haul to your chickens to eat. Or you can use some salt to pour on the slugs in the bucket to get rid of them. Another great option is to throw the slugs into your compost, they can help the composting process since they help break down decaying matter.
Barriers
People often use things such as copper rings or copper tape to help keep the slugs from crawling up on the r plants or getting near them.
Another barrier option I like to use is chicken wire cut and formed into cylinders to go around delicate plants. I use these often on seedlings that get transplanted to the garden. While these won’t keep young small slugs out it will keep the big older ones away from your delicate seedlings along with other common pests that can take out your young plants.
Diatomaceous Earth is also another option to create circular barriers or borders around your plants such as chamomile. While it won’t get rid of slugs, it will deter them since it is not comfortable for them to cross over diatomaceous earth.
Traps
Slug beer traps or slug oil traps are popular options to help lure slugs to their demise. You can create these with normal everyday items you probably already have in your house and put them out before sunset and go retrieve them in the morning. These are a great option to help control populations no matter if you have slugs eating vegetation or not.
Remove Favorable environments
If you have a lot of rocks or shady damp places near your chamomile then this could lead to more slugs in that location than you would normally have. Slugs don’t like dry and sunny conditions. Remove anything that would give them shade and moisture.
Bait
Slug bait is another popular option that people use in places such as flowerbeds. They have a bad rap because of chemicals that used to be in slug bait but are no longer used. Currently, you can get organic slug bait that is safe for wildlife and pets in small quantities.
Trap Crops
Marigolds can be used as a trap crop to lure slugs away from your chamomile. This is a way of companion planting where the marigolds will be used as a sacrificial crop to help save your chamomile by planting them around the border of where you have your chamomile.
References:
- Slugs and Snails on Flowers. 2021. University of Maryland Extension. https://extension.umd.edu/resource/slugs-and-snails-flowers
