User avatar
Lindsaylew82
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 2115
Joined: Wed May 21, 2014 9:26 pm
Location: Upstate, SC

Re: How to organically control horn worms on tomatos

I've seen them parasitized, but the ones that I've seen like that are large. The ones I'm picking off are small. Big horn worms do BIG damage. Not a little leaf here, I little leaf there. In SC, they can defoliate and entire plant in 3 days. No kidding.

I have a VERY heavy garden patrol. I frequently see swarms of Tach's and Brac's. The BEST garden patrol member, is ME, when it comes to THW... The same is true for army worms. If I see a leaf with a hole, or a poop trail, I'm on it like I'm lookin for the last word of a word search puzzle! Up, down, across, back, and diagonal... Like Liam Neeson in Taken...
Hahahahaha
Hahahahaha
image.jpg (16.4 KiB) Viewed 1682 times
In all seriousness. If I saw one on a plant that wasn't doing well, I'd let it go, and watch it.....very closely.

I don't normally see many...2-4 per year. But I've seen 4 already this year. So it's going to be a heavy year for them here.
I have some pretty heavy woods around me and 100's of acres of pastures that are filled with Queen Anne's lace. I'd say I live in the country, not in the city.

User avatar
feldon30
Senior Member
Posts: 209
Joined: Thu Apr 17, 2014 7:42 am
Location: Rock Hill, SC
Contact: Website

rainbowgardener wrote:"As an ecological gardener, you would need to patrol the garden several times a day without vacation in order to catch hornworms before they become a major problem. A single worm can strip a 4 foot tall tomato plant to the ground in a day"

Nope. As an ecological gardener, I never have to worry about hornworms. Whenever I see one, it has already been parasitized.
Must be nice. :)

User avatar
rainbowgardener
Super Green Thumb
Posts: 25279
Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
Location: TN/GA 7b

Re: I've seen them parasitized, but the ones that I've seen like that are large.

That is true, by the time they look like the picture, they are big worms. But some people have called the white things egg cases. They are not, they are pupae/ cocoons. Long before it got to this stage, the adult wasp laid her eggs inside the hornworm. They hatched out into larvae and started eating the live worm from the inside out (eww !!). Only when they are mature enough to pupate do they emerge and form the cocoons. So that poor hornworm has been quite slowed down for a long time and did not do a whole lot of damage. Eventually you will see the white pupae with holes at the top. That means the adult braconids have left their childhood home and emerged to start the process over.

Re JayPoc saying he had never seen a THW parasitized. Do you grow the flowers to attract the adult braconids? The adults are nectar eaters.



Return to “TOMATO FORUM”