What animal is eating my leaves and how do I stop it?

[pillsnpistols]

This past week something has bitten whole leaves off of my bell pepper and tomato plants. One of the bell pepper plants has no leaves left on it but has 2 half size peppers still hanging untouched. I saw posts about tomato hornworms but I looked everywhere, didn't see any, and it doesn't seem to match the description of my problem anyway. These are planted in topsy turvy tree planters, so whatever it is must be climbing up there or big enough to reach it. I have a fenced in yard so I don't think it is a deer, although we did see a deer once last year in our yard. I live in Cincinnati, Ohio. What is my next move? Camp out in the back yard with a camera and pellet gun? LOL

[rainbowgardener]

Hi welcome to the Forum! We are collecting a lot of Queen City gardeners around here! I'm also one.

Interesting problem since the tomatoes are hanging from a tree and your yard is fenced. Squirrels could easily do that, but I don't think they would have any interest in tomato leaves (tomato fruit is a different story!). If you think deer could get in, they could definitely do that. Cincinnati is pretty over run with deer and they are excellent fence jumpers.

Your damage could be slugs, but I would think having the plants hanging like that would deter them.

Otherwise try coming out at night with a flashlight. There are a number of plant eaters that only are active at night.

[pillsnpistols]

Thanks for the reply! I talked to some neighbors and people have seen deer on our street recently. So I am going to spray some deer repellent and hope for the best. Gotta love all these deer in our city!

[greenheirloom]

Did this work? Was it deer after all? Let us know how it turned out.

[pillsnpistols]

So far so good. After the original post, we have had deer walking down the street every night. They have stayed out of the garden since I sprayed Liquid Fence. I haven't seen any new leaves missing. So I think it's going well. And new leaves are coming up on the bell pepper plants. So they will hopefully be ok.

[TheMarshain]

After having done an extensive internet search I found the camouflaged hornworm that eating my pepper plant leaves. I snipped off the leave it was hidden under along with it and took it to the chicken pen. Our ever exotic-snack lover, Cayenne, said, "Thank you."