Slugs are serious agricultural pests. Besides oilseed rape, slugs cause strong damage to all species of winter cereals. Experiments were designed to determine the sensitivity of four species of winter cereals (rye, barley, wheat and triticale) in early stages of plant development to damage caused by the slugs Arion lusitanicus and Deroceras reticulatum. The least damaged by two species of snails were seeds of winter barley. In contrast to cereal grains, seedlings of winter barley were strongly attacked by A. lusitanicus. The damage caused by D. reticulatum to seedlings of four species of cereal was similar.