A Slug Ate My Railway! And then came back.

[Dr.Glum]

Yesterday evening I was mortified to spot this damage in the railway room (conservatory).

 

Bio hazard. Rotten little mollusc! Slug or snail? How dare you touch my building, you blankety-blank expletive laden little S**t. In the dark with a torch I checked around but could not find the culprit, and strangely there are no tracks on the brickwork that the item was against.

Nothing else has been nibbled. This is not the last card structure to be placed on the layout so fresh glue may not be the attraction. The item had not been sprayed with my usual fixative - significant?

Needless to say I shall pay attention to anything that is brought in from the garden, i.e. seat cushions, gardening shoes, etc. This morning I have deployed slug bait on and under the layout.

The laborious construction of this low relief item and its location on other structures is described in

 

Edited September 27, 2023 by Dr.Glum

[ISW]

26 minutes ago, Dr.Glum said:

Nothing else has been nibbled. This is not the last card structure to be placed on the layout so fresh glue may not be the attraction. The item had not been sprayed with my usual fixative - significant?

Did you spray the completed models with a 'waterproofing' spray (the one you use on umbrellas, coats, etc)? That's what I usually do, so I'm wondering if that helps in these (unusual ...) circumstances. I'd have though that the waterproof 'layer' would prevent the creatures saliva from damaging the model?

 

Ian

[Dr.Glum]

Interesting concept, the waterproof spray. Yes, it should give some protection. I just plain have never seen a need, with the previous layout in the loft and now this one in a conservatory, which although without an insulated roof, is in theory sealed and like an unheated indoor room. But you've made me think. What was your original motivation and where do your buildings live?

For the record, I had a search, and my spray (against UV fade) is Daler-Rowney Perfix Colourless Fixative (for Pastels).

[Michael Hodgson]

40 minutes ago, Dr.Glum said:

Needless to say I shall pay attention to anything that is brought in from the garden, i.e. seat cushions, gardening shoes, etc. This morning I have deployed slug bait on and under the layout.

 

 

Not sure that will help.  The little sods prefer my fruit & veg to any slug pellets I put down in the greenhouse, so I think the idea of varnishing or similar overspray treatment is your best bet to prevent recurrence.  The fact that it's a conservatory probably doesn't help, but even upstairs you might not be safe.  Although they haven't come in, I've even seen snail trails up the wall of a single storey extension, across the flat roof and down the other side!

[33C]

It might have been a "Racing snail".

I had one.

I took the shell off for better aerodynamics,  but it became sluggish....

 

Bye!

...Slam.

[ISW]

2 hours ago, Dr.Glum said:

But you've made me think. What was your original motivation and where do your buildings live?

When I started making my very first buildings in ~2015, I was living in Malaysia where the sunshine is quite harsh (and the humidity rather high!). I can't remember where the impetuous came from to 'waterproof' the models, but I recall being concerned that the inkjet paper & ink was prone to easy damage by water. As I already had some simple / cheap waterproof spray, that's what I used (after a quick test ...) on the models I built.

 

Those original models have been sitting on a window shelf (here in the UK) for the past 6-years and are still perfectly okay. They were printed on a Canon inkjet (MX-868) using Canon inks. That 'may' be relevant, but I've no proof (or otherwise).

 

Ian

[Dr.Glum]

Each evening in the dark I've been on wee beastie patrol with a torch and am pleased to report no further incursions by the aliens. I think (from traces of very faint trail) they or it came from the top of the wall where the roof of the conservatory meets the house.

I have made this appetising bait trap, using oddments (hence the odd shape) of the same card stock, same ink cartridge print sample and same pritstick. Come ye intruders: down the wall, creep over the edge onto the card, munch the paper and glue yum yum, then for dessert, slug pellets.

Next I need one of those motion cameras (like my chum has now, having had to buy one to see if it was a badger digging up his lawn) with the threshold set to the setting marked 'tediously slow'. 😀

[Dr.Glum]

You’d think I’d have removed the scenery for safety, wouldn’t you. Doh!

They strike again! More extensive, but should be easier to repair. Faint trail down the wall went past my bait trap, which I have now moved over to straddle the trail. Below is damage along the platform.

Next they/it went past the station building and had a further wander/graze.

I am now (belatedly) removing all card structures into the house, while carefully checking for no hiding passengers of the nibbly sort. Below, I found the underside of the canopy has had some attention last night.

I’ve now laid out new paper/glue/card bait and pellets on the baseboard.

[ITG]

I too had an encounter with a slug. Just after my newly built (brick construction) railway room was finished, I’d just started the baseboards and there, in an up and down single trail on the walls, was traces of a slug track. Closer examination revealed some tracks on the carpet tiles, again all new. 
I can only think that it came in with various tools and timber brought in after a long period of garage storage. 
I laid slug pellets all over the carpet tiles, for about a week. Then hoovered everything up. Never found the culprit dead or alive, and no further problems as far as I can see.

Ian

[dave750t]

Only half facetious - try leaving the track power on all the time. More seriously, would some sort of electric fence work?

[figworthy]

8 hours ago, ITG said:

I too had an encounter with a slug. Just after my newly built (brick construction) railway room was finished, I’d just started the baseboards and there, in an up and down single trail on the walls, was traces of a slug track. Closer examination revealed some tracks on the carpet tiles, again all new. 
I can only think that it came in with various tools and timber brought in after a long period of garage storage. 
I laid slug pellets all over the carpet tiles, for about a week. Then hoovered everything up. Never found the culprit dead or alive, and no further problems as far as I can see.

Ian

 

There seem to be lots of slugs (and spiders) around here.  Talking to my neighbours, they have watched one squeeze through the tiny gap at the bottom of the patio door (where the two halves meet when closed).  Making somewhere slug proof can be "interesting".

 

Adrian

[sjp23480]

I recently needed to take an old lawnmower to the recycling site, but it needed to be emptied of petrol.  

 

Tipped the petrol into some old tupperware and left it out to evaporate, rather than pouring down the drain.

 

Next morning, there must have been half the slug population of Kent in there.  

 

I know you can use beer in a slug trap but petrol worked a treat!

 

 

[ruggedpeak]

On 27/09/2023 at 12:12, dave750t said:

Only half facetious - try leaving the track power on all the time. More seriously, would some sort of electric fence work?

with a Gaugemaster "Relco" unit attached, soon sort the issue.

[tjf4375]

How bizarre! It looks like the 'slug-slime' is acidic and eating away at the paper and ink. I agree with others your best bet is to make sure everything is well sealed with a matt varnish or similar. If it wasn't for the colour fading I'd say it gives quite a nice random weathering effect, but probably not what you had in mind! 😂

[MartinRS]

Have you tried deploying these throughout the layout?

[ste234]

We've had slugs in our kitchen most mornings the last few weeks. I watched one squeeze through a gap less than 5mm the other day. Don't even know where it went to! 

Hope you get sorted, I'd be gutted if they made it onto my layout!