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Oklahoma Gardening

What's attacking my tomatoes?

14 years ago

Are these slug holes?

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Comments (6)

elkwc
14 years ago
Look at these pictures. Looks to me like it could be a tomato fruitworm. Dawn correct me if I'm off on this. Jay

Here is a link that might be useful: Tomato fruitworm
Okiedawn OK Zone 7
14 years ago
Hi Y'all!

Ilene, I have to confess that I don't have slugs so have never seen slug damage on tomatoes. When we lived in Fort Worth, though, I only saw them on plants and not on fruit. I agree with Jay that the likely culprit is the tomato fruitworm.

If you cut into a fruit, the worm still may be there. I often see green ones and brown ones and every now and then a blackish one. They all look basically the same but the color varies. To supplement the info Jay linked, I've linked the Oklahoma State University digital diagnostic page on fruitworms.

Jay, I think you're right (as you always are). When I have tomato fruitworm damage, it looks exactly like what Ilene is seeing on her plants.

One of the things I have found oddly fascinating about tomato fruitworms is how their name changes depending on what they are eating. For example, if we see them in ears of corn, they are called tomato earworms. If we see them in cotton, they are cotton bollworms. If we see them in tomatoes, they are tomato fruitworms. In general, they are just disgusting caterpillars!

Ilene, I don't know what to recommend as far as control of the current maturing fruitworms. Because there are multiple generations in one summer though, spraying Bt will knock out the succeeding generations, but BT is less effective on the ones already attacking the fruit. Sometimes after it rains (not likely to happen here anytime soon, but more likely there at your place), I find them on the ground as if the rain has knocked them off the fruit and plants.

Jay might have an idea for how you deal with an already mature bunch of fruitworms.
Y'all stay cool today. It is so hot!

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: OSU Digital Diagnostic Photo--Fruitworm
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ilene_in_neok
Original Author
14 years ago
So far I haven't found anything in the holes except tons of ants! I'm pretty sure they're secondary, though, as these holes are perfectly round and seem to have an 'edge' around the hole.

I wouldn't know how to garden if I didn't get swarmed by ants at least once a day.

We have had quite a lot of rain this past week, and now it's 94 degrees at 1:15 in the afternoon.
Okiedawn OK Zone 7
14 years ago
Ilene,

I know 94 degrees must feel excrutiatingly hot with the humidity you have there.

We're a kind of miserable 99 here, but I feel positively "cold" in comparison to a few counties in NW OK where the temperatures are in the 109-110 range as of 1:40 p.m.

Our local weather forecaster says he thinks the "Heat Advisory" so many of us are under through 9 p.m. Sunday may be expanded for another day or two or three. That is not very encouraging news.

We also have more ants this year. They are everywhere. I've used a spinosad fire ant bait in the veggie garden but haven't used anything in the yard. I'm about to break down and put out "Come And Get It" fire ant bait in the yard. (It has spinosad in it too and has been very effective when we have used it in the past.)

We have a huge bed of Red Harvster ants in the driveway right beside the garden and I don't mind them. I hate the fire ants though.

Dawn
elkwc
14 years ago
We have hit 104 here which it is now. Had a call from a coworker in the Beaver area before I left work and they were 110 with wind. Not much wind here. The humidity is 12% also. Which helps over where you both are I'm sure. A chance of rain and some that look promising. If it is our turn maybe we'll get a little. Hope you are can stay cool. Jay
Okiedawn OK Zone 7
14 years ago
Jay,

So....the radar I use has been showing storms passing over your county, but the NWS forecast this morning said the storms would be mostly "dry thunderstorms" with "dry lightning strikes". Did you get rain or dry lightning or was it another one of those storms that passed a few miles from y'all?

I think our highest heat index here was about 104 or so. Ardmore had a HX of 110 around dinner time according to Arbuckle Weather Radio.

We are drying up quickly here, so even though our AM humidity starts out high, it is going down into the 20s in the afternoon. With the current heat and no rainfall, I expect our Keetch-Byram Drought Index number to start going up about 14-15 points a day, which is very, very bad for us.

Dawn

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