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Go out into your garden and see which direction they will likely come from, just look for the shiny snail tracks. That is where you will place your beer. You can work this out by leaving a small seedling out over night and watching where the snails mainly come from. Just look for the snail trail which is the shiney path they leave behind. This also works for killing slugs.
Have a few dishes available and make a well in the ground so that the bottom of the dish is lower than the surface of the ground. (The top of the dish should be level with the surface).
Just fill the snail beer trap dish with beer and leave it, go inside, relax and let the snails have a party outside with your beer. From my experience garden snails have very quiet parties so you will still get a good nights sleep.
When you arrive back in the morning its probable you won't see any snails as the early birds will have taken them for their breakfast or some will be lying up-side-down in the dish drunk and totally incapable of eating your plants.
I did this for the first two to three weeks of the new Raised Garden Bed - No Dig Garden and had no problem with snails at all. By that time the seedlings had grown large enough to not be troubled by snails.
I have been asked if snails prefer full strength or light beer. We only used full strength beer as I wanted them to get drunk, fall asleep where they were and not wander off to eat my seedlings. This really is a festive organic pest control idea.
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