The brilliant green beetles are "fig beetles" ... native SW species. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Figeater_beetle And yes, that OMGITSBIG!!!!! wasp thingy is a cicada killer. Impressively huge, but single-minded about hunting and hauling cicadas back to their nests. they are not likely to sting unless you grab it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sphecius_grandis

Forgot - if it is in a barrel, that may be part of the problem. Be sure it's getting enough water. I tried growing one in a barrel once and it didn't do well at all. I had to put it in the ground and it was very happy. I don't plant them in pots or barrels any more. You might also ask about this on the Florida forum, or Southern Gardening forum. There are LOTS of brug growers in Florida, that's where a couple of mine came from.

This is my firs posting and I can see this is an old discussion but will try. I am also fighting the yellow bugs on my hoya. My fault for keeping it outside whjile we were living in a rental while we built a new house. My hoya is large and old. I started it from one leaf from my mother-in-law almost 40 years ago. It has never had bugs until a year ago. I have been fighting these yellow bugs on the new growth for the past year. I am going to try the alcohol treatment with water bath (insecticidal soap did not work in long term). I see that Amazon has Bayer Tree & Schrub on its website but it also has an Bayer insectide for aphids etc. Has anyone tried that?

Tomato hornworms (Manduca quinquemaculata) are more common West of the Rockies, while Tobacco hornworms (Manduca sexta) are more common East of the Rockies. I raise mine on Datura, a member of the Solonaceae family. They will also thrive on Brugmansias, Nicotiana as Dawn says, tobacco, potatoes, pappers, eggplant, tomatillos, and many other ornamentals. They do seem to prefer Tomatos and Datura in my garden. The adult moths are quite large and very pretty. They are great pollinators of many deep-throated flowers, that other insects may not be able to reach. Manducas have a very long proboscis, about 4-6". And, no, the cats do not "bite". They don't have stingers, or teeth, or anything of that nature. The "horn" is very soft to the touch. When I check my tomatos for larvae, I look for things like munched leaves - especially at the tops of the plants where the more tender leaves are from new growth; frass, or caterpillar poo, which is large, dark green pellets, on foliage. If I am lucky, I might find the large, spherical green eggs on the undersides of foliage, layed singly. If it's a cluster of eggs, it's not a sphinx moth, but something else. Tobacco sphinx have white slashes across the length of their body, but Tomato hornworms have chevrons. The Tobacco hornworm's horn can be red or yellow, while the Tomato hornworm's horn is always black. You may find a large hornworm with little white cocoons amassed on it's body. That means it has been attacked by a parasitic wasp. The wasps eat the hornworm from the inside out. You may not want to kill a hornworm that exhibits these cocoons because you may want to have more parasitic wasps around to take care of the hornworms. If you want to save it, you can't. People sometimes try pulling the cocoons off, but that won't do any good. They are already at work inside the caterpillar. The cat is a goner. I love having the night-flying sphinx, often referred to as hummingbird moths because they hover at flowers like the hummers do. The adults are extremely beneficial in the garden. You can grow extra tomato plants to move the cats to, or grow another plant they like. I grow Datura which gets huge, and I move the cats to this plant. You can enjoy a great portion of their life cycle. They have many predators as it is, like the wasps, birds, and other insects. There are many other night flying and day flying sphinx moths commonly seen in gardens. Day flying sphinx include the Snowberry Clearwing - a small sphinx that resembles a large bumblebee - and the Nessus sphinx, a reddish brown sphinx, a bit larger than the Snowberry, that has two (or sometimes one) cream colored stripe across the lower abdomen. When I put out my rotting bananas for the butterflies that like to nectar on them, I often see the Nessus sphinx enjoying them, too, and they are such fun to watch. The White-Lined Sphinx is a larger sphinx seen nectaring on flowers during the day. Night flying moths often seen in Oklahoma include the Pink-Spotted Hawkmoth, Eumorpha sphinx, Pandora Sphinx, Virginia Creeper Sphinx, Trumpetvine sphinx, Elm or Four-Horned Sphinx, and Tersa sphinx. There are many more, but too many to list all of them. I have raised many of these found in my own yard only. Quite interesting. My GD helps me with them and she is very interested in nature now. Whatever you choose to do with them is up to you, tho. I know Dawn usually plants extra tomatos for her Tobacco hornworms, and since she lives in a rural area, she sees many more of these beautiful sphinx moths than I do because many of their larval host plants are found in rural areas. Susan