Slugs. Solutions?

Two weeks ago field beds were striped with lines of pale green seedlings.

I sowed into a few beds that I confess I had round upped as I was too late to sort them out and cover them as per usual before the hideous rains came and came and came. I sowed others into beds that had been weeded and sown in autumn, had large crops of seedlings in waiting which then sat with standing water on them for weeks and weeks and weeks and drowned. So there was nothing in them and I just rotovated them and had to start again.

So the beds were clean to start with.

Now there are all but no seedlings out there. Literally. 90 per cent have been wiped out. Presumably it's those little slugs that have had such a joyous wet winter and damp spring.

But beds at the other end of the gardens are fine - there I weeded roughly and rotovated and I knew there would be masses of weedseed and self seeders coming up but I was late sowing and decided to sow thickly then weed later. For the last couple of weeks they have looked disastrously weedy but I finally got to them over the last couple of days and there are masses of healthy flower seedlings, and it hasn't been hard weeding out the rest.

So perhaps that's one answer, don't worry about clearing the beds too carefully, then even if there is a slug problem there's plenty of other vegetation for the slugs to eat and plenty of chance for the seeds you want to come through.

I use municipal compost round perennials such as echinacea and delphiniums as it's gritty enough to deter all but the more determined sluggy visitors.  But can't use that for seed sowing. And besides, I think all the slugs in the field are those little tiny soil dwelling ones, not the big ones that wander over the surface.

The next question is, how to replace the earlier field sowing. I think timing is going to be everything as apparently it's going to get hot again soon and send the little blighters down deep, but needs to be damp enough for germination first.

Sometimes I wish for more raised beds. They raise seedlings slug free.

The British Flower School at Mapperton

The day arrived, we opened the doors, courses began. We started with floristry on the wild side, a walk through the gardens looking at shapes structures colours and form, then made generous arrangements using lots of wild and hedgerow materials as well as cultivated flowers. I think you'll agree from the tiny selection of pictures below that we had a grand day!  Even the wisteria had come out on the wall of our basem The North Stable Block at Mapperton, to greet everyone.

Course places are filling up fast, do go onto the website and check us out
www.britishflowerschool.co.uk
We are also doing bespoke days and half days for groups - so far including small tour groups and gardening groups. We only have 8 people max per course.

the first May wedding

May arrives for the bride called May, and lovely May garden flowers..... as ever I forgot to take pictures of most of it! I used masses of lilac, solomons seal, rosa banksia, ranunculus, rosemary, stocks, lily of the valley, Aztec pearl, phlomis, honeysuckle, willow........