Leaf miners taking over

[Francis Barnswallow]

I finally have a good tomato harvest coming up soon, but noticed the leaf miner population is exploding on my tomato plant leaves now more than ever.

Any advice on how to keep them under control?

[rainbowgardener]

They are very difficult to treat with any kind of pesticide, organic or not, because they are protected inside the leaves. But you can just pull off any leaves you see with the squiggles on them and dispose of them (not in compost). As long as you don't have such an infestation that you will be defoliating your tomatoes, it will be fine. In the future, if you pull leaves as soon as you see any, it won't get to be an infestation.

For next year, consider planting some velvet leaf nearby. It is a yellow flowered wildflower. I discovered that it is a great trap crop for the leaf-miners. They love the soft leaves and colonize it in preference to anything else.

[Francis Barnswallow]

Will do, thanks!!

[Francis Barnswallow]

I found out what they look like and there size. I seeked and squished around 50 of them.

[rainbowgardener]

Are you sure you are talking about leaf miners then? You usually never see them, because they are inside the leaves, between the top and bottom sides of the leaves.

They just make these light colored squiggly trails through the leaves:

[url=https://www.google.com/imgres?imgurl=https://ventnorpermaculture.files.wordpress.com/2008/06/typlmdamage.jpg&imgrefurl=https://ventnorpermaculture.wordpress.com/2008/06/07/plant-pests-leaf-miner/&h=375&w=500&sz=79&tbnid=wrGORG-XWiV4RM:&tbnh=98&tbnw=130&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dleaf%2Bminer%2Bdamage%2Bimage&zoom=1&q=leaf+miner+damage+image&usg=__XV1liv9fj2IOPFciet7JI_lO3JA=&sa=X&ei=A4-9TNTVO82bnAft6MSJDg&ved=0CCAQ9QEwAw]leafminer damage[/url]

[garden5]

RG's right, it sounds like you may have something else. Unless, of course, you are referring to squishing them while they are in the leave. I've thought of this idea, but it seems like you would end up killing the leaf anyways since it's hard to know exactly where in the leaf they are. Personally, I'd just pull the leaves and know 100% that the miners are gone.

[bradhurl1]

With leaf miner damage your best bet is to remove the leaves that has been infected,certain plants are however more susceptible than others and a good prevention strategy is spraying neem on the plants as early as spring.

[Francis Barnswallow]

I've seen them trying to get out of the leaves. They are tiny (size of a BB) orange worm. And they leave the squiggly tracks on the leave. I squish them in the leaves as well.....carefully. I found a couple today, but not nearly as much as yesterday.

[garden5]

I've seen them trying to get out of the leaves. They are tiny (size of a BB) orange worm. And they leave the squiggly tracks on the leave. I squish them in the leaves as well.....carefully. I found a couple today, but not nearly as much as yesterday.

I guess if you can get them in the leaves successfully, then it's worth a try. That would be an especially good method if you had a heavy infestation. It would allow you to avoid completely defoliating your plants, at least.

I'm wondering, though, will the leave still live with the sqiushed leaf miner in it?

[thanrose]

Yes, I've done the squish in the leaf method and it works. My ex liked the "paper punch over the specific leaf miner method", and that worked too. The tomato leaves are actually pretty resilient and have enough capillary action that the leaf continues to thrive, just with a hole or a silvery dead squished area.

And yep, little orangy wiggler. Probably lycopene rich.

This approach is very time consuming, though. As soon as you see the silvery or grayish green tunnel, look for one end that is a little plumper. The miner when very young is not quite as orange. Sometimes you can look for the miner poop end of the squiggle and that's where it will be, but that depends on the poop not settling to a lower elevation.

[Francis Barnswallow]

I guess if you can get them in the leaves successfully, then it's worth a try. That would be an especially good method if you had a heavy infestation. It would allow you to avoid completely defoliating your plants, at least.

I'm wondering, though, will the leave still live with the sqiushed leaf miner in it?

It was borderline infestation. It started on one tomatoe plant and then jumped to the others. I tried pulling leaves, but if I continued to do so, there wouldn't be many leaves left on the plants. The first day I killed around 50 leaf miners, the second day around 12 and this morning I killed 4.

So far the leaves are holding up, even with the squished leaf miner still in the leaf.

I'll keep yall posted.

[keen gardener]

If there is silverly/white lines in the leaves then it is leaf miners and you can try white oil? You can get it at your local nursery.
Cheers Keen Gardener

[Francis Barnswallow]

**Update**


Leaf miners still attacking the tomato plant and spreading to others, but this plant is huge now and is still producing lots of tomatoes. I emailed "Ask Tom" who contributes gardening tips for News Channel 13 and he said to use spinosad for leaf miners.

I will apply it b/c they're taking over.......even after squishing hundreds of them.