I used to have snails. Now I have slugs. But the controls, I believe, are pretty much the same. If you're not willing to go on nightly snail raids or set up beer traps (google "slugs" and "beer" and you'll probably get lots of good hits, plus maybe a few about guys watching televised sports), you can go get a product like Sluggo. It's iron sulfite or something like that, and it's not toxic to much beyond slugs and snails--it eventually breaks down and might actually be good for the soil. I don't think slugs and snails munch all that much on roots (unless they're semi-exposed like through the drainage holes of a pot) so much as eat tender foliage, but I could be wrong on that.

Hey Nathan, I hope you're not offended. My husband said 'Watch, he'll be from Victoria!' and I said 'Oh he is!". All this after I posted the message, of course! I didn't know what VB stood for. Of course, being an aussie, you should be able to take some teasing. =) ; ) Ah, all in good humour. I ended up getting Coors light. Personally I didn't care which brand I used, because I don't drink beer (nasty stuff!). I don't think I've caught a single snail though! Perhaps I had fewer than I thought. Except that I've seen baby snails on the glass. Why aren't they going for it?!? Stupid snails. . .

The lime can be rooted from cuttings. My experience with rooting citrus is that what works best is short cuttings (3-4 inches long)with the growing tip present. The cuttings should be green but a little firm. No brown wood should be present. Is it a Mexican Lime (same as a Key Lime)? Mexican Limes are the small real juicy ones with thin peels. The larger, pulpier, thicker peeled limes are Persian Limes. If it's a Mexican Lime, it's easy to grow them from seed. They mostly grow true from seed. Most of the seeds in the fruit are nucellar. "Nucellar" basically means that they just went ahead and made embryos without bothering with all of that pollinating and sex stuff. Each seed contains one embryo. What happened is that an individual cell in the ovary decided to just turn into an embryo. So, they are genetically identical to the parent plant. I've grown Mexican Limes from seed and they have produced plenty of fruit without being budded to a rootstock. Budding onto a rootstock is really not necessary if you are growing the tree in a container.

I think the worst weed someone could have is bindweed. Its flowers are purple that look kind of like morning glories, but it will wrap around any plant and actually strangle it, hence its name. It also has a tap root and is hard to pull up. If it breaks off, more of it starts growing again. My neighbor across the alley from us always has some growing and I keep an eye out for any of its seedlings on my property so I can pull them up if I see them when they're small. It is not a native plant either. I think it is from Africa and is on the invasive species list. So, I don't think any of the snails would eat this one since they wouldn't recognize it and it grows so fast, it would probably wrap itself around one of those snails before they could get out of its way!