Slug Patrol

Saturday, 26th April 2003, West Yorkshire

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lettuce We put some seedling lettuces in the greenhouse a few days ago. We soon noticed that some leaves were being nibbled to lace while one plant disappeared altogether. I've started covering them with a cloche overnight in an attempt to keep the slugs off them.

Even with this precaution a small buff-grey slug had found its way in this morning and was hiding, curled up at the edge of the cloche. It got thrown into the meadow.

I used some brown parcel tape to repair the holes in the old home-made perspex cloche I've been using.

Homing Snails

While I'm fuming about this our friend Jill who's been staying with us starts telling me about her slug problems. Her garden is in a damp hollow in the hills near Newcastle and the slug problem there seems intractable. One of her neighbours removed snails from his garden and says he marked them with red paint then released them 800 yards away.

They soon found their way back!

Kingcups

With half an hour free I decide to draw the kingcups with my Art Pen (a fountain pen with a nib designed for sketching). As I said the other day, I find the simple structure of the flowers and leaves makes a good subject to draw.

richard@willowisland.co.uk