Slugs are a common pest that can take over your garden and destroy all your hard work. While it may be tempting to reach for slug repellents or salt, these can also cause damage to your garden and harm to other, more beneficial, wildlife. However, this isn’t actually necessary, and there are a number of plants you can grow that will help keep slugs and snails at bay.
While plenty of plants attract slugs, others actually deter these pests and can be used to protect your garden. Typically, the plants that slugs avoid will have rough, hairy, or serrated leaves and/or be highly aromatic.
Lady’s mantle
The experts at Garden Ninja have highlighted lady’s mantle as one plant that slugs will “avoid like the plague.” This plant’s slightly hairy leaf texture is the main reason that it deters slugs, especially after it rains, when the water pulls on it like oil.
Another benefit of lady’s mantle is that it is super easy to grow, in both sunny and shady areas of your garden.
This slug-detering plant also self-seeds, meaning that after just planting a few, they will propagate themselves, protecting even more of your green space from slugs.
Foxglove
The hairy stems and leaves of the foxglove plant make it rather unappealing to slugs and snails. They also have the benefit of being colourful and attractive additions to your gardens.
They are also reputed to be the cheapest plants to grow from seed, and they’ll even grow in partial shade, meaning you can protect an urban garden from slugs.
The pros at GardenNinja add that, like lady’s mantle, foxglove is another plant that can keep popping up season after season, keeping your plants protected for years to come.
Sea holly
Sea holly’s tough leaves and prickly flowers mean it’s impossible for slugs to climb and eat, and these can help deter these pests from other plants that have been grown nearby.
Another benefit of sea holly is that it lasts all the way from May until October, meaning it’ll protect your garden for months at a time.
More slug-resistant plants
- Hardy geraniums
- Geums
- Carex
- Lungwort
- Beardtongues
- Moor grass
- Spurges
- Giant hyssops
- Sedum
- Epimedium
- Lavender
- Catnip
