This year, there are much more naked snails than in recent years, reports agroinform.hu. According to the paper, the fact that the toxic classification of the active ingredient metaldehyde has changed is due to one of the European Union’s restrictive measures limiting the use of plant protection agents, making it difficult to protect against slugs.
As a result, since July 31, 2021, the conditions for purchasing snail killing preparations containing this active ingredient have been tightened, i.e. their free circulation has ceased.
The situation is further complicated by the fact that there are no other effective snail control preparations available.
It is István Hunyadi, President of the Chamber of Engineers and Herbalists of the Hungarian Plant Protection Society for Agroinform He said: “We have also received information that the numbers of homeless snails have increased dramatically in some parts of the country. A few years ago we called the Spanish slug the main pest among the species of slugs, but today it is not necessarily only this species, but slugs in general that damage garden plants.” The excessive growth is attributed to the mild winter and the rainy and humid weather in the past few weeks. The natural enemies of this pest (such as frogs) are also disappearing.”
I should add that the Spanish snail is said to not like any animal species that could be its natural enemy. And the possibilities of the producers are limited, unfortunately with the tightening of the availability of the active ingredient metaldehyde, we have reached the end of the possibilities of chemical protection
Added Istvan Hunyadi.
