Tomato Killer

The Enemy -- Tomato Horn Worm

This is the evil tomato Horn Worm.  He camouflages himself on your tomato plant and gnaws his way through the stalks, just when plump green tomatoes have begun feed the fantasy of having so many tomatoes you might even have to give some away.  One morning you are lovingly watering your tomatoes, inspecting the blossoms, admiring the fruit, and sniffing the fragrant basil plants thriving in the same pot. Next day you come outside and the whole plant has keeled over...hacked to smithereens by something you'd swear has teeth.

But no, the culprit is not a squirrel, or a chipmunk or a deer. It's a green worm with horns that hides under the leaves of your plant, lays eggs and gets into the soil, so you've got to get rid of them, literally handpick them (UGH) out of the plant. The larvae blend in with the plant canopy, and therefore go unnoticed until most of the damage is done. Wasps are the horn worm's natural predator, but honestly, who would want to even attempt to catch and release a wasp. 

The caterpillar reaches the final maturity in 3-4 weeks, and is 3 1/2 to 4 inches when fully mature. Fully-grown larvae then drop off of the plants and burrow into the soil to pupate. During the summer months, moths will emerge from pupae in about 2 weeks. Moths emerge from the soil, mate, and then begin to deposit the eggs of the next generation on tomato plants. By early fall, the pupae will remain in the soil all winter and emerge as a moth the following spring.

The horn worm likes nightshade plants and will also attack eggplant, pepper and potatoes. This is one hungry and vicious garden predator.  Last Friday I bought two tomato plants to replace the ones my horn worm killed, and they were destroyed overnight before I even got them out of their peat pots!  Tomato lovers beware.

Comments

[Leah Weiss Caruso]

wow does that thing look creepy. sorry about your tomatoes!

[Sue]

aren't they gruesome? the wasps will lay eggs on them so you will see the hornworms with little white things stuck to the outside of their bodies. yuck.

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