PITY the poor slug.

It’s good news on the one hand - slug pellets have this month been outlawed, due to the danger they present to other creatures. But, on the other, gardeners have been advised to dispatch them with alcohol instead

Experts from horticultural charity Garden Organic say that slugs’ love of lager makes the drink the easiest way to trap them.

Slugs are 64 times more likely to be caught in a trap containing lager than water, an experiment by the charity found.

I can’t believe how cruel this is. I would feel uncomfortable drowning anything, however small and slimy. Yet, for slugs, drowning in beer is seen as a ‘happy’ ending. Would a human experience a ‘happy’ ending if thrown into a vat of beer?

The idea of slugs suffering a slow death, whether too drunk to be aware of it or not, I find abhorrent.

I hate the term ‘garden pests’. Even the respectable Royal Horticultural Society, bandies it about. Their revered members even put out a league table of the top garden pests of the year.

Slugs and snails usually command the top spot, followed by the vine weevil and the box tree caterpillar.

Gardeners go all out to destroy anything labelled ‘pests’, but, not to be too sentimental about it, these creatures are simply living their lives. Slugs and snails, for example, are a valuable part of an ecosystem, providing a food source for hedgehogs, frogs, toads, birds, ground beetles among others.

I admit, slugs are not a gardener’s best friend. They think nothing of chomping their way through the crops you have carefully nurtured. There would be less damage to your cabbages if you put them through a shredder.

We are all too ready to place various animals, birds and insects on the red list of pests. I reeled in horror this week when I saw the headline ‘How to get rid of crows from your garden - six key tips to banish bird pests.’

The article, in a national newspaper, described how crows ‘can prove a disruption to gardens across the UK, eating their way through vegetable patches and disturbing other birds’, before asking: ‘So how can you get crows out of your garden?’

I welcome them to mine. They are wonderful birds, and fiercely intelligent. I have two who regularly visit my garden. They sit on the garage roof and watch through the kitchen window, cawing when they see movement. They then fly on to a low-hanging branch of a tree and wait until I throw them a scrap of meat.

They are quite partial to ginger snaps, which I give them as an occasional treat. They dunk them in the bird bath to soften them. I’ve also seem then stretch pieces of food to stack more in their beaks before flying off. They are not daft.

It’s terrible the way they are persecuted, along with magpies, who may have unsavory habits, but also have as much right to live as the next so-called pest.

Crows eat slugs, so there’s a natural slug killer right under your nose.

Squirrels, pigeons, mice, spiders, ants, wasps - we are too ready to kill and dispose of anything that doesn’t gel with our lifestyle.

Yet whatever ‘pests’ live in your garden, they are sure to have a beneficial side, whether as predators, a food source or a pollinator. We should live and let live.

And if you really want a good, humane slug-clearing tip, take a couple of slices of melon skin and throw them on your veg patch. If you pop out during the night the fruit will be covered with them and they will leave your cabbages alone. Relocate the skin to your compost heap or simply leave it. It works for me.