Photo courtesy of SlugNet.
Building healthier soils requires trial and error, and sometimes uncovers side effects. While no-till and cover cropping offer immense benefits to soil heath and water quality, they also create the perfect habitat for slugs.
Dane Elmquist, a conservation cropping specialist with the Division of Extension, tells Mid-West Farm Report the 2024 season was particularly challenging for growers in the Northeast Fox-Wolf watershed area near Green Bay. A combination of a mild winter and a wet spring slowed crop emergence, leaving young plants vulnerable to heavy feeding. While chemical rescue treatments are limited in Wisconsin, especially for soybean growers who cannot use common metaldehyde-based baits, researchers are finding that the solution might lie within the cover crops themselves.
“One of the nice things about these conservation cropping systems is they also bring in a lot of beneficial insects… that can be your allies in pest control and are especially good at eating slugs early in the season,” Elmquist says.
By delaying cover crop termination until at or after planting, farmers can foster populations of “natural enemies” that hunt slugs. To better understand these dynamics, the UW-Madison Division of Extension has launched SlugNet, a statewide citizen-science monitoring project.
“We’re starting from ground zero here in Wisconsin with what we know about slugs and where they are in the state… we started this statewide monitoring project called SlugNet, which we are actively recruiting volunteers for,” Elmquist says.
The project uses high-tech traps, or simple roofing shingles placed in fields, to track slug activity. As the 2026 planting season approaches, researchers are calling on farmers and agronomists to join the effort to turn the tide against this problem.
Learn more: https://slug-net.com/
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