Beer as attractant for Arion vulgaris Moquin-Tandon, 1885 (Gastropoda: Pulmonata: Arionidae)

Arion vulgaris Moquin-Tandon, an invasive slug, causes losses in crops all over Europe. Small farmers commonly use beer traps to control this pest. Our aim was to check which components of the volatile fraction of beer were important as slug attractants. Five beer brands available at the Polish market: Żubr, Warka Full, Karpackie Pils, Żywiec and Leżajsk Full, were used in the experiments. We examined the slugs’ behaviour in the laboratory, using a star-shaped olfactometer (two-hour tests), and in the field (three-day tests with traps). Particular beer brands attracted the slugs to various extent, depending on the composition of their volatile fraction: the number of slugs caught in the traps was positively correlated with the content of decanoic acid and negatively with that of acrylic acid N-hydroxysuccinimide ester and CO2. kEy woRds: Arion vulgaris, beer, attractant, pest, trap