This knowledge came with my first real garden battle of the season. As you likely know, I recently planted a garden. And, thanks to copious amounts of torrential rain, it has begun to sprout. I am super, super excited. There are little baby lettuce leaves and the tops of green onions and carrots. AWESOME. So last night I was wandering around the border of my supermarket destined to feed families throughout the city when I saw something weird. It was like a giant worm, but much slower (really didn't know that was possible). My grade school science made me rule out snail (no shell), so I had to deduce it was a slug. Cool. Never seen a slug. Not so pretty. But I did what any respectible city folk would do--I took a photo. The slug smiled and kept on his glacial pace across my garden. I went in to finish my glass of wine.
Hmmm...this is 2011. Perhaps I should Google whether slugs are good or bad. I did so and found, across the board, they are bad. Very, very, very bad. They, despite their seemingly slow moving lifestyle, are capable of mowing down entire rows of seedlings before you even put the iPhone back in your pocket. They're evil. Well, crap. So, I did the next logical thing that any city person would do. I went out with a fork and...don't bother to cover your eyes...I picked each of them up with the fork and flung them over the fence into the neighbor's yard.
Yep. I was too weak to kill them. I went through article after article about how to do it. Most methods had to do with impailing them or setting out egg shells so that they cut themselves as they wander across the garden. I was fully capable of doing so. Hell, I was a shark for nearly a decade, I can totally take care of a slug or two. But the problem is a moral one for me. If you (bug, animal, person, etc) are in my home or endangering my family, then you will get pummeled. End of story. But here, I sort of felt like I was in his home. This poor disgusting creature was just going about his business, and I was going to light him on fire and do a voodoo dance (one of the more obscure websites)? So, naturally, I made my poor neighbor woman's life hell and made him her problem. I couldn't be the death squad. I am a weakling.
Sort of. In the end, I actually went for a combination of methods. I couldn't bear the thought of my beautiful little seedlings being taken out. So I put out traps. Made of beer. Seriously--that's what is recommended. You put a container (in this case, an empty baby food jar) of beer in the ground, and they run to it. It's open bar night. Then they drown. And the reason I figure this is ok is because I am thinking some Darwinism is at play. If you're too stupid to stop drinking before you drown, that's not my problem. So happy drinking, my slimy little friends.
I may be cold-blooded, but I'm not a killer. Today. Who knows what another week in the wild will do to me.
UPDATE: I originally wrote this post last night, as I was so amped up about the entire situation. Well, as of this morning, my morality has changed. There were slugs EVERYWHERE. And, they were happily munching on my poor little seedlings. Done. I started dropping them into the vats of beer, without remorse. I figure that's a decent way to go--drowning in rather expensive brew. I have a new mentality. To quote the character Billy Ray brilliantly played by Eddie Murphy in one of the greatest all-time movies, Trading Places, "We have to kill the mother-f*&kers. We have to kill them!" Guess it took less than a week.
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