I don't know if you've only gardened in more northern areas, where cutworms do indeed cut off plants only at the ground level, or if you've gardened in the south before. Here in the southern part of the country, we do have climbing cutworms that cut off plants well above ground. It also could be something else. If the cut-off portion of the plants are disappearing, as in being eaten, it could be squirrels, deer, rabbits, or maybe certain birds. For the animals (except for squirrels), a fence will protect your plants. For birds, bird netting put over them may protect them, but some small birds can get under the netting. For squirrels, a good dog or a gun, or bribing them by putting squirrel food or bird seed well outside the garden might keep them away from your plants. I always keep small, shallow pans of water on the ground outside my garden for the birds and small wildlife and having that water available to them keeps them from attacking my plants because they are desperate for water. I also make 'wildlife puddles' whch are mini ponds for them in other places on the property to draw them away from the garden. During drought, many natural sources of water dry up and that causes wildlife to destroy plants when all they're seeking is water. If the cut-off portion of the plants are being left lying on the ground, it could be some birds. They'll clip off the tops of the plants and drop them on the ground. To the best of my knowledge, we don't know why this happens but we know it does. Often, but not always, the mischievious birds are mockingbirds. They might be after water from the plants' stems. If you think it is cutworms, there are a couple of solutions. The best one is to put cutworm collars around the plants. If the plants are in the ground and adding cutworm collars now would be problematic, then you can stick a twig, a popsicle stick or two toothpicks (on opposing sides of the tomato stem) or something similar into the ground on either side of the plant. The sticks need to be so close to the main stem of the tomato plant that they are touching it and cutworms cannot squeeze between the sticks and the plant stem. If the cutworm cannot wrap itself completely around the stem, it can't cut it all the way through. I like to buy a bag of bamboo shish-kabob skewers, break them in half, and insert one-half of a skewer on either side of a tomato plant at the time I transplant it into the ground. I put about an inch or two of it into the ground and leave the rest above ground to deter climbing cutworms. That's your quickest fix. Another solution is to spray the plants with Bt 'Kurstaki' but since is it a slow kill product, the cutworms may cut off your plants before the Bt stops them from feeding. I put Slug-Go Plus (active ingredients are Iron Phosphate and Spinosad, and it is organic) on my ground to keep pill bugs and sow bugs from eating my young tomato and other vegetable seedings and the spinosad in it has pretty much wiped out all the cutworms in our soil. I do use it every spring though and what it appears to have done is to decrease the number of cutworms slowly over a period of several years. Like most organic products, it is slow-acting and not a quick solution in general, although it works remarkably fast on the pill bugs and sow bugs for which I use it. I have used DE for years and its performance with cutworms has been unimpressive, although it works well to deter some other pests. Dawn

I agree with the majority, the little beasties are a true pest! I always thought they were the workhorse of nature and that their good out-weighed the bad but no more! I have great soil and mulch with different kinds of things, pine needles, bark mulch and straw from my chickens. They have multiplied into the thousands. The last 2 years they have eaten off the sprouts of my Angel Trumpets so bad that they have failed to bloom for the last two years. They are in the dead stems from the previous years growth. I can't eliminate them unless I dig up the plant and cut away those stems. It is not happening because the clumps are very large and I worked hard to get them established. They are also in the hostas and in my tomatoes. They get in every house plant that I put out over the summer and I have to repot everything every year or lose them over the winter because the little turds eat the roots and leaves of my house plants. I am ready to use whatever I have to do to eliminate them. I have plenty of birds and toads, frogs and parasitic bugs in my garden, I encourage spiders and all other good bugs and even my chickens will not eat them. I tried and suffered the damage from my chickens in the hopes that they would eliminate the little buggers. Spinosad is a natural organic method of killing pests the same as Bt has been used to eliminate cabbage worms. It is also the ingredient in Comfortis that I give my dogs for flea control. I will try the beer but if it dosen't work I am going to bring out the big guns!!!

On Amazon, at least, there are three formulas of BugGeta. Not all have metaldehyde. This is the one I used-- it says the active ingredient is Sulfur. A review says this: "A number of new products popped up on shelves these days for snail and slug control to replace classic but poisonous metaldehyde ingredient. The new products are made using iron phosphate, ferric sodium EDTA, and sulfur. Iron phosphate is a very popular new ingredient, and more recently studies found that ferric sodium EDTA is even better and kills faster than iron phosphate, so this showed up in products such as the familiar Corry's brand. Now this Ortho sulfur based product is the most recent formula that I've come across. Sulfur is one of the oldest insecticides people have used, and sulfur is used for organic production. Like iron based products, it is also a plant fertilizer and safe for pets. However sulfur generally doesn't pack as much of a powerful punch as the modern insecticides. If sulfur was highly effective for killing snails and slugs, people would have used sulfur a long time ago for this purpose rather than using the poisonous metaldehyde. Regardless, I still think this is very useful to rotate into the mix along with my favorite, ferric sodium EDTA, to apply multiple pet safe strategies so that the snails that are somehow able to resist one ingredient cannot escape a different ingredient." Ortho Bug-Geta Snail and Slug Killer, 6-Pound http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00N6X8OWE/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_dp_ss_1?pf_rd_p=1944687742&pf_rd_s=lpo-top-stripe-1&pf_rd_t=201&pf_rd_i=B000FI5MUU&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_r=1306CMZHFWSVJGWXJACY

Oooh, these are great additions to the list! Keep 'em coming... Nicole -- That's a good point about the Rose of Sharon pollen. When I initially started out planting for pollinators, I was only vaguely aware that bees would prefer some plants for nectar, but others for pollen, and some for both. Here's an interesting list from Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_pollen_sources The borage I have is from Botanical Interests. I planted a couple seed packets about nine years ago, and it STILL faithfully reseeds itself without fail every year on both the east and west sides of the fenced backyard. It seems to like the warm rock mulch especially, so I end up transplanting a bunch of seedlings every spring back into the beds. Deb -- Yeah, they really do love the catmint, don't they? I was a little worried mine had cross pollinated with the true catnip this past season, but the flowers just opened this week and they're still that pretty Walker's blue. (My catnip has white blooms.) Recent sightings: Mostly small local bees, Painted Admiral butterfly, Painted Lady, Field Checkerspot, a White Striped Black (new to the list) and some variety of cutworm caterpillar (future miller moth...?) that was relocated away from the herb garden seedlings. Oh, and not a pollinator but I also came across the largest jumping spider I've ever seen on the raspberry canes. About the size of my thumb! Still no honey bees in the yard, though. It's really weird...