yea but my bird will eat your worm!

Nice. How did you get a bird? I think I would rather a bird than the worm... hehe

I like Terrybull's visitor better than yours because hornworms give me the creeps too. They exist and I expect to see them, but my skin still crawls whenever they show up.

Catbirds and robins also do a good job of getting rid of hornworms too. That is, once they figure out where the worms are. I had some hornworm damage last week, but I've seen the catbirds swooping down on the garden and haven't seen one of those creepy crawlers yet and no additional damage.

And, no, that thing that looks like a stinger is not a stinger. It looks pretty intimidating but won't do any harm.

Yeesh! I found some huge poops on some of my tomato leaves yesterday. They looked like blackberries. I followed the trail up the branch, and there was a fat horn worm, holding very still and watching me. I had to go into the house, get my rubber gloves, and pull him off. I could feel him wiggling around in my hand before I dumped him in the soapy water jar. I almost gagged. I'm good with toads, lizards, snakes, spiders and all kinds of insects--but those horn worms get to me.

Last year, I found a hornworm. I went inside the house and sipped whiskey until I thought I could touch the thing/pull it off of my plant. On my way back out the door, DH handed me these very large tweezers!! No need for the whiskey;-) Having the worm trapped in the tweezers and clicking away was therapeutic, in a sick kind of way.

Have not yet seen any this year....

The first tomato plant I grow managed to attract one of these suckers. This was before I actually studied how to grow tomatoes, veggies, roses...everything garden wise really. I thought the horn worm was a friendly caterpillar going to be a pretty butterfly. And then my plant died. That little stinker!

My niece was trying to grow an "organic" garden without any form of pesticides. I got a call from her last week about the "giant caterpillars" eating everything in sight. She had left for the 4th of July weekend, gone all of 3 days, and when she got back about 2/3s of her entire back porch garden (half dozen tomatoes, bell peppers, assorted other stuff) had been stripped to the stems.

Those hornworms were the size of your finger (seriously, we measured one at just under 5 inches long). All the work she had put into those plants was gone, and she was out for blood.

Bottle or two of sevin spray later and I saved as much as I could. Was amazing how BIG those things got, and how fast they got there!

Why spray for hornworms. They are one of the easiest pests to get rid off, hand pick, drop on ground and step on them. End of story. You don't need whisky, tweezers, soapy water. Just grab, drop and stomp.

I have over 400 tomato plants and 300 peppers and that is what I do. I use to collect them and then feed them to our chickens. It was always a good laugh (funny sense of humor) to watch them play tug of war. We lost all our chickens so I am back to to stomp method.

Jay

Good dose of sevin keeps them from coming back. Picking off the ones big enough to grab only treats the symptom while leaving the underlying cause untreated.

Good dose of sevin keeps them from coming back. Picking off the ones big enough to grab only treats the symptom while leaving the underlying cause untreated.

That treatment (Sevin) is worse than the disease.

Dave

Austinnhanasmom, I love your technique--a little "Dutch courage" before going out to face the beast with your killer tweezers!

Jay, your "grab, drop, and stomp" technique would make a good youtube video. I can see you working your way down the rows to a good line dance tune! But please don't show us the bottom of your boots.

And don't disrespect the jar of watery death. I think my soapy water dunk is more efficient, especially in the heat. Only two steps: grab and dunk, move on down the line. At the end, throw it on the compost. :-)

I think the hornworms would become a beautiful moth.

When I picked hornworms off of plants last year, with tweezers, my son wanted to keep them as "pets". I figured - sure. The worms were placed in a butterfly habitat and all but one died. The living one formed a cocoon. Although not yet hatched, it was quite pretty before becoming cooked in our hot garage.

My kids fail to obey when I say "Don't eat that until I wash it", so no spraying nor dusting in our yard.

I've tried companion planting but have to say that it has not prevented the worms in my garden.

Hornworms make some folks go from organic to non-organic.

@Digdirt-Dave: Question. If someone has been organic up until hornworm time and then applies Sevin dust, does that make their plants non-orgranic?

To tokizy yes by definition but, im surprised no one mentioned dipel I found some of those worms but they were on pepper plants so I guess they don't count

Your worm may be bigger but my 6 worms end-to-end on the same 2 plants are bigger! Yea, just got back from vacation (only 4 days) and I've picked a total of 7 horn worms & several cabbage worms. Yuck! Six of the horn worms were an impressive size & all hanging out on my 2 Moskvich plants. I'll be spraying DT tomorrow.

Austinnhanasmom:

DH sent you outside to fight Godzilla alone? He should at least have provided you an additional drink! No chivalry in CO?

also i have a cat that will eat your dog!

tdscpa - DH has seen hornworms and is scared ;-) He buys the whiskey.

terry - I love the photo!

That treatment (Sevin) is worse than the disease.

That would imply that sevin harms the plant you spray it on. It does not. While it is indiscriminate in the insects it kills, and will take out pollinator and pest alike, that comes down more to being careful when you use it.

A plant that is not producing flowers or has already gone into making fruit with no more flowers for the year isn't going to attract pollinators, so I see no problem with some chemical protection.

No, I'm not an organic farmer, and I'm quite okay with that. =)

Hi everyone, been gone for awhile' so I thought I would check in to see what everyone was talking about. And I've been wanting to fine out if anyone knows how to get rid of garden wasp.
But yes those little or big green worms turn into a hummingbird moth, I used to have them around all the time during the summer until someone around here let the garden wasp out. Now I can't keep a worm alive, I've have done just about everything I can' but nothing yet - still working on it. Look them up.
Have a good one - Spider

I say there is a need for whiskey when you are walking through your garden, start studying defoliage, determine the culprit is a hornworm. You know to look for black dropping to track the whereabouts of this stealth clown. By now, you are problably half way into your plant when..you look up and spot the worm an inch from your head.

Yep, that requires a drink. Something about the fact you are looking for something you know is there, yet you cannot for the life of you find it, until it scares the hell out of you.

Take care,
Travis

I had a couple last year, but none seen so far this season. I figure I'll never get one again now that I have a bearded dragon who would LOVE to partake in a fresh, wild worm instead of store bought crickets. If I get one, into the terrarium he will go.