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Daily gardening tip · Northern hemisphere · Friday 18 September 2026 · early autumn

Check Under Pots for Hidden Slugs

As autumn brings damp weather, slugs and snails look for dark, wet places to hide during the day.

Check Under Pots for Hidden Slugs
10 minuteseasypests
  1. Walk around your patio, deck, or garden beds where you keep container plants.
  2. Carefully lift up outdoor pots, saucers, and loose flat stones.
  3. Look closely at the damp undersides of these objects for resting slugs or snails.
  4. Remove any pests you find and dispose of them away from your garden.
  5. Lower the pots and stones back into place.
A garden in early autumn

Why it works

Slugs and snails are active at night and must shelter from the drying sun during the day. They naturally gather under heavy, cool objects where moisture stays trapped. Finding them in these hiding spots lets you control their population before they crawl out to eat your autumn plants at night.

Discoid Beggarticks

Plant of the day

Discoid Beggarticks

Bidens discoidea

A native North American annual herb found in wet habitats such as marshes, bogs, and stream banks. It produces branching green to reddish stems bearing trifoliolate leaves and yellow-green flower heads that lack prominent ray petals

Read about it →

Gardening news

Gardening news

Limited garden space restricting efforts to support wildlife, study finds

A study found that most surveyed homeowners are unlikely to make more changes to help local wildlife because they do not have enough garden space.

The Dirt · 2026-09-17
New research

Scientists decode genome of edible samphire to help crops grow in salty soil

Researchers completed the full genetic blueprint of six species of Salicornia, also known as sea asparagus or samphire. This edible plant thrives in high salinity where standard agricultural crops cannot survive. The discovery could help breeders create climate-resilient crops for regions with poor water quality.

newcastle.edu.au
On this day

Moldova establishes the Chișinău Botanical Garden

On 18 September 1950, an official decree authorized the creation of a botanical garden in Chișinău. The garden was initially built along the Durlești river valley before expanding to its present 104-hectare location. Today, it hosts extensive collections of roses, aquatic plants, and native Moldovan flora.

en.wikipedia.org · 2007-01-04

Written for the northern hemisphere. Gardening south of the equator? See the southern edition

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