Well, I finally got tired of watching all the holes mysteriously appearing on my plants, got off my lazy bhut and went out last night with a flashlight.
I found about 8 slugs in my planters (all levels except the tomatoes). They don't seem interested in dill or tomatoes. Dumped 'em in a plastic cup, salted them and threw them in the garbage.
Went out again tonight and found 6 more in the planters. Checked my less hot peppers that I have in the ground and found another 6. One of them was a grand-daddy. This explains why three out of my 15 or so ornamentals completly disappeared. Salted and dumped 'em.
Set some beer traps: cut some 6 oz. dixie cups in half (height-wise), dug a small hole and buried them so the top was flush with the ground and filled them with beer. While doing this another 3 grand-daddys appeared! I think they all wake up at different times. Probably if I went out agin now I'd find more.
Alot of people on this forum have posted pics of their swiss cheese leaves. Mine looked just like that (including my cauliflower). I haven't seen an earwig around in years but I really didn't expect the problem to be slugs because alot of the damage now is to the top leaves (used to be to the bottom ones). I think they just like the tender newer leaves. Actually caught a small slug that climbed to the top of one of the plants. It seems the small ones are light enough to do that.
While setting the beer traps I found one of my cayenne plants way in the back has almost disappeared too. Its a stub about one inch tall with one leaf remaining. It was about 12 inches tall when I bought it. I think I remember seeing someone's posted picture of their plant like that too back in the early spring.
Hope this helps but the only way you'll know for sure is to go out on a night patrol.
I found about 8 slugs in my planters (all levels except the tomatoes). They don't seem interested in dill or tomatoes. Dumped 'em in a plastic cup, salted them and threw them in the garbage.
Went out again tonight and found 6 more in the planters. Checked my less hot peppers that I have in the ground and found another 6. One of them was a grand-daddy. This explains why three out of my 15 or so ornamentals completly disappeared. Salted and dumped 'em.
Set some beer traps: cut some 6 oz. dixie cups in half (height-wise), dug a small hole and buried them so the top was flush with the ground and filled them with beer. While doing this another 3 grand-daddys appeared! I think they all wake up at different times. Probably if I went out agin now I'd find more.
Alot of people on this forum have posted pics of their swiss cheese leaves. Mine looked just like that (including my cauliflower). I haven't seen an earwig around in years but I really didn't expect the problem to be slugs because alot of the damage now is to the top leaves (used to be to the bottom ones). I think they just like the tender newer leaves. Actually caught a small slug that climbed to the top of one of the plants. It seems the small ones are light enough to do that.
While setting the beer traps I found one of my cayenne plants way in the back has almost disappeared too. Its a stub about one inch tall with one leaf remaining. It was about 12 inches tall when I bought it. I think I remember seeing someone's posted picture of their plant like that too back in the early spring.
Hope this helps but the only way you'll know for sure is to go out on a night patrol.
