This morning's garden foray was weird.
Where were all the gastropods?
In 30 minutes of serious hunting, in past hiding places and what looked like reasonable candidates as auxiliary hiding places, I mostly came up empty. Some possible explanations for this:
- I've put a serious dent in the snail and slug population, and they need to do some serious reproducing to replenish their ranks. (I doubt I'm this successful so early in the campaign.)
- The snails and slugs that remain are hiding in the far recesses of the yard (like way the heck under the wisteria in the corner). From there, they may eventually make their way out to my hunting grounds, but at their snail's pace, they haven't yet.
- The relatively low humidity this morning (it was slightly less dewy than usual) means the snails and slugs were lying lower than usual (maybe beneath the soil) in my established hunting grounds.
- Maybe Thursday is the gastropod day of worship and they're all off ... worshipping somewhere else?
Yeah, I don't know.
Even thought I'm happy that maybe my sustained efforts are making a difference, my snail-picking time felt less efficient with so many fewer in evidence for me to pick.
Today's take: 28 snails and slugs (in 30 minutes).
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This morning, it seems like the pickings were somewhat slimmer.
Part of this may have to do with the weekday morning time constraints (30 minute time limit). However, it seems like some regions of the yard that were swarming with gastropods over the weekend had only a few wee snails this morning…
The pattern of dry, overcast mornings continues.
Not very satisfying weather for a gastropod hunter.
The only gastropod action this morning was under bags of compost and potting soil, plus one slug hiding on the side of a raised garden bed.
There weren't even that many weeds to pull while I was…
"It's never going to rain again."
-- Dr. Free-Ride's better half, contemplating cloudy skies over the last month or so
"Oh yeah?"
-- The weather in the vicinity of Casa Free-Ride, at approximately 4:45 AM today
It was not a torrential downpour, but there was a good, hard rain for 15 to 20 minutes…
This morning, like yesterday morning, was sunny and dewy, and just a little bit chilly.
Good snailing weather.
Actually, though, given recent gastropod ratios during my morning forays, it might be more accurate to call it slugging rather than snailing. Except that slugging already has a meaning.…
There just off building a really big trebuchet to retaliate for yesterday's incident. Well, you should hope it's just a trebuchet. I understand that when they get really angry RPG's are used. Gastropods are really vicious little buggers…
Rocket Propelled Gastropods?! Sounds awesome.
Some areas are cursed with migratory herds of gastropods. Once upon a time (in a much wetter climate that I won't be returning to) one morning the yard was thick with them. I wasn't much bothered, having nothing more than crabgrass and they were welcome to it. Less than a week later, the crabgrass was still there and the critters were gone.
The dog was curious, but I don't think he even tasted them.
I'd like a graphical representation of the haul by day. Perhaps we can extrapolate some trends.
I think it was significantly colder last night or rather this morning -- I wonder if there's a tipping point not only in humidity but ground temperature. Don't know for sure.
or their oracles finally got around to warning them off:
http://www.diggercomic.com/?p=121 ;)
It might be worth a shot to recruit a toad to aid you in your hunt. Gardeners' Supply Co has a toad house on sale: http://www.gardeners.com/toad-house/SnailsSlugsGrubs_Cat,37-461,default…
They're molluscs, not morons. They're onto you.