Do Egg Shells Deter Snails?
I’ve heard that snails and slugs will avoid broken egg shells and therefore that they (the egg shells) can be used to protect seedlings. I tested this claim by putting a snail out on the dirt and in the sun surrounded by broken egg shells. As you can see by the image the shells didn’t work.
I’ll run this test again once I get more shells with which I’ll make a more robust barrier.
(I wonder if snails would be similarly deterred by a ring of crushed snail shells?)
Tags: egg shells, gardening, snail
Interesting.
It may not be easy to produce conclusive results with the method used here. For example, the snail could not live in such a small circle, so would be driven to cross the barrier – against it’s (possible) avoidance to the shells (i.e. the deterrance overcome by need for survival)?
Perhaps rather than ‘trap’ the snail/slug in a ring of egg-shells, maybe present it with two equally survivable options, one involving shell-contact, and the other with none. I don’t know what that might look like, but just an idea that came to mind…
(embarrassing admission: for a second there, I thought you were saying that you had heard that slugs/snails could be used to protect seedlings… from egg-shell adversaries???
Gotta love grammar, aye? )
Good point. Perhaps a a good test would be to create an enclosed environment where the snail has a place to hide during the day and access to a single seedling that is surrounded by broken egg shells.
Sounds like a lot of work though eh? Mini snail electric fences and whatnot.
I’ve currently got Blitzem snail bait out and can say with confidence that it is very effective as snails are often found heaving in agony after having crept over them. But Blitzem is also bad for any other creatures that might accidentally eat them and I’m concerned for my young blackbird family a couple of metres away.
Hehe, guard snails. Now that would be handy.
But did you try using the egg of a chicken or of a fire drake?
If you use fire drake egg-shells the reason why snails — who are the mortal foes of fire drakes — won’t cross the shells is because of the well known fact that fire drake inner shell lining becomes highly spontaneously flammable when in contact with snail-trail mucus.
It’s simple zoology.
I’ve heard that if you leave out a bottle-cap full of beer, slugs will drink it and die. Maybe it works for snails too. It may be worth a try, but only if you happen to have an open bottle of beer
I’ll have to give that a go. But I hope they appreciate it as I’ve only got one very tasty bottle of Renaissance Pale Ale in the fridge at the moment.
I laugh at the eggshell myth as I to years ago used them as I had chooks, snails ate all my baby veg plants. I have seen snails on cacti, old worn sharp concrete, broken glass etc so why is a so called sharp eggshell gonna put the red flag out??? They laugh at and think were eggs