CAN GARDENERS MAKE FRIENDS WITH SLUGS AND SNAILS?

Slugs and snails have historically been maligned as the gardener’s arch nemeses – munching seedlings, decimating crops and ruining flowers. But is this reputation wholly deserved? The RHS and The

Wildlife Trusts don’t think so, and have recently launched the campaign Making Friends with Molluscs in an attempt to give slugs and snails a bit of a break from the hate. But it is likely to take some time for gardeners to adjust to the idea that they need to live in harmony with molluscs. In a recent poll by Gardens Illustrated, between 68 and 78 per cent of respondents still saw them as garden pests.

Jon Ablett (above) is senior curator of molluscs at the Natural History Museum and thinks they’re misunderstood. “Molluscs are an amazingly diverse group of animals,” he says. “They’re found all over the world and in almost every habitat. While gardeners may think that slugs and snails exist purely to eat their plants, they should remember that they are part of our complex ecological community, providing food for birds, insects, amphibians and small mammals as well as helping to process the soil and increase the cycling of nutrients. Not all species of slug and snail feed on living vegetation, with some preferentially eating decaying plant and animal matter and fungi or even other slug and snail species.”

No matter how much destruction they may cause to your hostas, slugs and snails are a vital part of our ecosystems and, perhaps they deserve some respect.