Snail collar

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Snail collars (also snail collars in southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland ) are a snail control measure to protect plants from snails and other intruders.

Types of snail collars

A snail collar is usually made of metal or plastic . The snail collar is a hollow body (usually a cylinder ) that is put over the plants to be protected and stuck into the ground; in the case of plants that cannot be slipped over, a container can also be cut open at the side and placed around the plant stem. A snail collar must have an edge at the top that is bent outwards at an acute angle like a collar. Snails are unable to crawl upside down and therefore cannot negotiate such an edge. Snail collars are therefore particularly effective, but they are more expensive than other measures against snails. For aesthetic reasons, snail collars are also used less often than other defense measures.

Snail collars for raised beds and wooden bed frames can be made inexpensively from aluminum fly screen strips, which are then attached using a stapler . In a raised bed, the snail collar should be attached about halfway up so that it does not interfere with the processing, but it should not be towered over by taller grass or meadow herbs, as these would then serve as a "ladder" for the snails to overcome the snail collar. Containers such as empty yoghurt pots and the like, from which the bottom has been removed and which have a small protruding edge, are also suitable for individual plants.

Comparison with other measures

  • One advantage of snail collars is that the snails are only repelled and not killed and that the problem is solved by attaching the collars once. In contrast to other snail defense measures , such as beer traps , they do not attract any further snails. They also have no influence on the soil or other animals, such as slug pellets .
  • Snail collars are superior to snail fences when it comes to protecting individual or widely spaced plants rather than beds.
  • Disadvantages of snail collars are the price, possible aesthetic problems, that they can hardly be put over larger or long-sprouting ingrown plants and that clump-forming perennial plants can be restricted by them.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Snails are important . Badische Zeitung from April 22, 2010.
  2. ↑ balance 11/2002: Control of snails - defense against snails in the home garden - organic better than poison .
  3. ↑ Stadtgärtnerei.bs.ch: Schneckenmerkblatt.pdf (PDF, 186 kB).
  4. ↑ Yoghurt cups as a snail collar .