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For a long time, occasionally we would come down in the morning to find slug trails around the kitchen sink / on stuff that had been washed.
These trails appeared to lead towards the back door (which is next to the kitchen sink). However I sealed up all possible entry points around the door.
This morning I came down to the kitchen to find this in the kitchen sink !
The sink is plumbed in to a Saniflo Pump, which pumps up and out to an external drain. If they are getting in from the external drain then they are clever little buggers and jumping about a 2" gap between the edge of the side of the drain and the waste pipe and then finding their way through about 3m of pipe to the sink!
All I can think is that some how they are living / breeding in the Saniflo / plumbing?? A couple of years back we had the Saniflo serviced and there was a lot of fat/food/sludge in the bottom of the Saniflo....cant imagine they can live in that sludgy chemical world though surely??
So how the hell are they getting in??
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Salt dude.
Salt won't work though as it will get washed away...
A lot of people swear by copper tape. Wrap whatever it is you don't want them climbing up / over.
An Eley No 7 should sort them out 🙂
Google it.
That is a very disturbing image. I'm sure I had a nightmare like that once!
Super strong salt solution - do it after dinner and don't use sink til 24 hours later. If you know where the outflow is, you could block it up and leave it full overnight?.
Would Caustic soda drain cleaner kill them off?
James Herbet wrote about this (didn't end well for the homeowners)
Agree with salting and leaving, also a bowl of beer to drown them in
Slides dinner away across the table.
We had this issue in our last house (short drain age run fron the sink to the man hole). Just buy value table salt and flush the drain with it every night for a week or so when every there is 'evidence' of activities.
As slugs are not renowned for their scuba capabilities, I would seriously doubt they are making their way through the saniflow. Most likely they have found a damp spot somewhere in the room (Under a cupboard, behind a skirting....) or are coming through an air brick or gap somewhere and emerging when the coast is clear.
Adopt and coexist. 🙂
Awesome - with picture 😀
Actually I've had slugs in my kitchen. Not the sink though. Mine's a first floor flat too. They seem to come through an air gap in the kicker board under the cabinets though not sure where they've come in from. The only openings outside would be the drain outside which they could climb up inside the pipe, but then they'd come out in the sink but they don't.
It's only been during a heavy downpour.
they'd come out in the sink but they don't.
As I said before, they aren't much for swimming and will not make their way through a water trap like the one under your sink.
They come in during wet weather for the reason as given above. They don't swim or make their way through water obstacles!
Often climbing walls outside and entering through air bricks or small openings.
I have even found them in attics, the underside of slates and other weird places. Gravity isn't much of a problem for something that can stick to most surfaces at any angle.
We have a problem with them in the conservatory. I assume they come in through the airbrick and then up through the cap between the laminate floor and skirting board. Amazing what a small gap they can get though. Not pleasant when you go in there barefoot and they squash up between your toes.
When it pisses down we always find loads climbing out outside walls (esp in summer but I think that's mostly because it's light when we're home so we see them)
As suggested, any gap in the wall and they'll be able to get in
(they go up your nostrils and eat yer brain, you know)
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When we had a little garden at our last place we'd leave little tubs in the ground containing the cheapest beer we could find. The slugs loved it - just remember to empty them regularly as they got pretty rancid and wretch-inducing after a few humid days.
James Herbet wrote about this
I think that was Shaun Hutson.
I don't wash my face in your sink
Last time I looked there were only 4 responses !
Ok if the Saniflo isn't the entry point then the only other entry point is an air extraction fan in the ceiling. Again I didn't think they would fancy climbing up an 1.5m external wall, and then through a pitch black void, and then out for through the extractor in to the kitchen.
To be fair I did use my bike LED light the other day to follow the slime trail (they appear to show up very well in LED light) and they did go up the kitchen wall in the direction of the extractor, I just assumed they had gone out exploring from the sink!
Why do they head for the sink then if they don't like water?
I had the same issue when I lived in Brighouse. They came up the waste (through the u bend) I couldn't stop it. Flushed it through with drain cleaner once a month and youd get a drain full of snail shells outside!
Horrible issue. Some of them were massive!
Smell of damp, mouldy food waste?
This is a guess but they look like leopard slugs. These are the good type that break down matter in a compost heap.
They will be after the food.
The horrible little creatures used to infiltrate my kitchen through the upvc door. It was like the scene from Aliens on the dropship ramp.
I assumed they were finding food scraps on the floor and kept the kitchen spotlessly clean but still they came in. Then the wife cleared away the mouldy autumn leaves from outside and they haven't been seen since. Suspect they were just adventuring from there.