The plants that slugs eat the most are typically those with leaves that are thin and soft. Hosta plants, for example, are well-known magnets for slugs; think of them as “slug lettuce.” By contrast, it is often safer to grow plants with leaves that have unappealing-looking textures. For example, these slimy pests tend to leave alone leaves that are rigid, that bear a waxy coating, or that are bristling with tiny hairs. Also more resistant are those that give off strong smells or that are bitter-tasting. Slugs especially like to eat seedlings and the new leaves on plants. If there’s nothing else leafed out at the time that they like better, they may make exceptions to their usual diets. They’ll eat the new leaves of some supposedly slug-resistant perennials and annuals. Much more thoroughly slug-proof are most of the woody plants (such as shrubs) and ornamental grasses. Slugs and their relatives with shells, the snails, are both gastropods (and mollusks). They leave behind a trail of shiny slime and big holes in the leaves of plants that they eat. They are most active where the ground is damp and the temperatures cool.
Cushion spurge (E. polychroma)Cypress spurge (E. cyparissias)Mediterranean spurge (E. characias)
Christmas fern (Polystichum acrostichoides) Cinnamon fern (Osmundastrum cinnamomeum) Japanese painted fern (Athyrium niponicum) Maidenhair fern (Adiantum spp.)
