Beauty and the Beast - Tomato Plants

[luvMIdog]

Just look at this little thing. It's a hummingbird moth. I think it's quite beautiful.

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Now THIS is it's baby....a ravenous tomato plant eater. This pic is from my daughters tomato plant in her yard. I have no idea what to tell her because I don't have any of those thank goodness. Anyone know what to do?
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Here are pics of my tomatoes on my first plants ever. They look good too me. These tomatoes are going to be big.

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[The Velveteen Ocelot]

1. How to get rid of tomato hornworms (hummingbird moth larvae):

"Management

Plants should be examined at least twice per week during the summer to check for tomato hornworms.

Cultural

Keep your garden as weed free as possible, to discourage egg laying on solanaceous weed hosts.
Till the soil after harvest to destroy burrowing caterpillars and pupae.

Physical

Handpick hornworms from infested plants (this is the most effective means of managing them). Tomato hornworms are fairly easy to find because of their large size. Just throw them into soapy water to kill them.

Biological

There are many natural enemies of the tomato hornworm. Various general predatory insects such as lady beetles and green lacewings often prey upon the egg stage and on young caterpillars. Another important predator is paper wasps, Polistes spp. This common wasp feeds on many types of caterpillars including those found in gardens.

Tomato hornworms are also parasitized by a number of insects. One of the most common is a small braconid wasp, Cotesia congregatus. Larvae that hatch from wasp eggs laid on the hornworm feed on the inside of the hornworm until the wasp is ready to pupate. The cocoons appear as white projections protruding from the hornworms body. If such projections are observed, the hornworms should be left in the garden to allow the adult wasps to emerge. These wasps kill the hornworms when they emerge from the cocoons and will seek out other hornworms to parasitize.

Insecticidal

Insecticides are typically not necessary. However, if the above options are not effective or practical, you may consider applying a product. Small caterpillars are more easily controlled than large ones. Be sure that if you treat tomato hornworms you do so before defoliation is severe."

https://www.extension.umn.edu/garden/insects/find/tomato-hornworms-in-home-gardens/

[luvMIdog]

2. Thank you very much I'll pass this info on to her :)

So far, I'm lucky. I check my plants a few times a day and I have mine growing in large clay pots. So far, all I saw was a spider in it's web. I left the spider there thinking he might eat bugs.

[demosincebirth]

27. Good luck finding them. They look like part of

the tomato leaf.

[Botany]

3. Let it eat some of the tomato plant's leaves .... the plant will grow new ones

If it is eating too much for one plant just move it to another one .....
or even take it home and let it eat some of your plant's leaves.

The damage is cosmetic. Keep the plants well watered w/just a little
organic fert ...... I like espoma plant tone.


Good chance that the hornworm will get covered with little white bumps
that are little wasp eggs.

[luvMIdog]

4. she just sent me a video. She found several of them on her other plant. She picked them off

[Botany]

8. You should if possible try to find a way to leave one or two around.

Because if you have tomato hornworms then you will get a little parasitic
wasp population in your yard that will control the population of hornworms
in the future.

I grow great tomatoes and I have a native wildflower praire next to my
garden and the hornwoms are attacked quick.

check and see if it is a tabacco hornworm or a tomato hornworm too.

[luvMIdog]

15. I'll tell her that. I have so many wasps here

[LeftInTX]

23. Parasitic wasps are itty bitty

[luvMIdog]

24. Oh. That's different. My wasps are big.

[Warpy]

5. The moths really are beauties. Hard to think they come from nasty hornworms

Hornworms aren't dangerous to us. I used to pick them off by hand and drown them in soapy water. I actually found few of them since I encouraged a neighbor's chickens to feed in my garden whenever the ladies would come visiting.

If you're squeamish about touching something that ugly, use gloves. I know I've been able to touch a remarkable range of icky doodle things as long as I've been gloved.

[luvMIdog]

7. I'm a very strange person. I have no fear of insects, but am scared to death of frogs, snakes, and

mice.

[Warpy]

10. I'm not squeamish about any of them, but I tend to scoop up the big desert cockroaches

and flush them because if I squash them, they tend to splatter. A lot.

I tolerate resident spiders because they eat bad stuff.

I wasn't that much of a girly girl when I was a kid, baited my own fish hooks, played with frogs.

I guess we've all got things we don't like. For me it's crowds and loud noises.

[luvMIdog]

13. I'm with you. I hate crowds.

[NRaleighLiberal]

6. tomato horn worm - remove and destroy (put it in a bird feeder) CORRECTED see below

they are ravenous! If you find them with what looks like rice grains attached, you leave them - they've been parasitized by a wasp that, when the babies hatch, eat the worm from the inside out making more little wasps. Natural predators!

Just looking at your post, Botany - horn worms - esp here in NC - will decimate plants quickly!

rechecking the pic - that isn't a hornworm, but the larva of the hummingbird moth - probably related, probably not as ravenous as the true hornworm (produces a different looking moth)

This is the moth of a tomato hornworm

[Botany]

9. I used to have problem with them but now i have a nice population of .....

.... braconid wasps and they are hammers on hornworms.

[luvMIdog]

12. did you place the wasps there or did they just fly in themselves?

[Botany]

18. they came in on their own

http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/galveston/beneficials/beneficial-04_braconid_wasp_on_hornworm.htm

1) Plant native plants

2) Try when possible to not use insecticides .... and if you really need to
use insecticidal soap.

3) We should have 1 billion insects per square acre of
much of America. Over 95% are beneficial or at the least
neutral. "Bugs" make up the 1st trophic level in our ecosystem
and they are critical parts of the ecology.

[luvMIdog]

19. I never use insecticides I've used neem only on my fruit trees. Yeah I plant native plants now,

except for roses. I love roses. I planted a sage bush you should see how big it grew. It looks like a tree now & blooms all over it most of the year. I don't even water it. Sage bushes are native Texas plants.

[NRaleighLiberal]

16. A few hornworms here in Raleigh can take down the top 6-10 inches of a tomato stem

Some years we have lots, some few, some none - last few years, hardly any. Wasp parasitizing is occasional as well.

[Botany]

20. If possible plant some extra tomatoes in another area of you garden .....

..... and let nature do its thing. You will not get any tomatoes from those
plants but if you are lucky the braconid wasp population will join you garden party.

[NRaleighLiberal]

21. well, I've got volunteers that pop up here and there - best I can do.

Intense deer population and limited sun limits me to planting in my driveway!

got 100 tomato plants, all different, most part of my annual R and D....fun year in progress (got a whole slew of variegated leaf dwarf growing candidates - waiting to see fruit quality)

[Botany]

22. Deer have now made it all but impossible to grow tomatoes in .....

.... some areas now.

[luvMIdog]

11. Interesting. Maybe I don't have any because I see small birds landing on my pots every day all

through the day examining those plants and then flying off. I have so many birds out here in the country. I have too many wasps ! That s why the yellow scissortail fly catcher birds fly around my house all day. They eat wasps. So far my plants are pest free, but my daughter lives in the city close to a creek, so her yard has more pests than mine that are visible I think. My yard gets full bright sun. Her yard has many shaded places

[msdogi]

14. Let them be

There's usually enough plant for everybody, and birds Wil find these really tasty treats

[luvMIdog]

17. That may be why I don't have any. I have an abundance of wild birds out here & so many small ones

coming through my land in bunches pecking everything

[LeftInTX]

25. You could try Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis)

It is considered organic and is specific for caterpillars and nothing else.

[JHan]

26. I let them be, because I love moths. I usually use netting to protect my plants...

If pest control becomes a problem.

[Donkees]

28. I call hummingbird moths 'humbugs' :)