Having lunch with some gardening friends yesterday I suddenly heard myself saying the following
‘Well, I’ve mulched with horse manure which is reasonably well-rotted, but there’s probably a bit too much straw in it which is going to lock up the nitrogen in the short term. Fortunately I’ve still got some nettle tea from last season which should be able to make up the deficit.’
And I thought: that’s coming dangerously close to me sounding like I know what I’m talking about with this gardening lark.
Fortunately, the slugs were on hand to disabuse me of that notion by chomping half of the baby lettuces I’d planted out the day before.
What did work for me was cheapo cereal bran spread in a 4 inch wide band around the plant. The slugs really could not be bothered to cross it, esp if there was a decoy plant next door to it.