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Old 02-07-2007, 04:20 PM posted to triangle.gardens
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Default Tomato (and pepper) Hornworms

Saturday, my tomato and pepper plants look great. I check the garden
mid-day Sunday and, HOLY COW, i'm missing 20% of my tomato foliage/
stems...about 20 tomatoes have been munched on...and my sole hungarian
pepper plant has every fruit on it munched and all but two leaves are
missing.

I spent 1/2 hour or so plucking and killing hornworms...about 15 of
them.

Any solution to this besides checking the plants every day? How long
do these things go on? Checking online it looks like they might be
around for a couple of months. Some suggest parasitic wasps...but not
sure how you go about managing those. Another suggestion was "bt"?

Help?

--
John

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Old 02-07-2007, 06:12 PM posted to triangle.gardens
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Default Tomato (and pepper) Hornworms

On 2007-07-02, Teech wrote:
Saturday, my tomato and pepper plants look great. I check the garden
mid-day Sunday and, HOLY COW, i'm missing 20% of my tomato foliage/
stems...about 20 tomatoes have been munched on...and my sole hungarian
pepper plant has every fruit on it munched and all but two leaves are
missing.

I spent 1/2 hour or so plucking and killing hornworms...about 15 of
them.

Any solution to this besides checking the plants every day? How long
do these things go on? Checking online it looks like they might be
around for a couple of months. Some suggest parasitic wasps...but not
sure how you go about managing those. Another suggestion was "bt"?

Help?


Sevin dust.

--
John



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is a garbage address.
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Old 03-07-2007, 12:01 AM posted to triangle.gardens
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Default Tomato (and pepper) Hornworms

In article .com,
Teech wrote:
Any solution to this besides checking the plants every day? How long
do these things go on? Checking online it looks like they might be
around for a couple of months. Some suggest parasitic wasps...but not
sure how you go about managing those. Another suggestion was "bt"?



Handpicking works well (they are easy to find, you can even hear them
chomping). You could also use Bt (Bacillus thuringiensis) which is a
bacteria which will stop them eating and therefore kill them. Some
formulations of Bt are organic approved and it's considered to be
extremely safe and effective. You can get it as a powder to dust or a
liquid to spray. Check the label to make sure it lists hornworms since
different strains of Bt are used to control different types of
catepillars.

I have always had sufficient parasitic wasps around to take care of all
of the hornworms. If you see one of the hornworms with the wasp pupae
on its back, let it be. The wasps will hatch and then eat the hornworm
from the inside out (leaving a deflated sack of a catepillar). The
hatched wasp will then parasitize more hornworms and will take care of
the problem pretty quickly with no effort on your part.

Here are some photos:

http://chatham.ces.ncsu.edu/growings.../hornworm.html

The bottom photos show the white wasp pupae of a parastized hornworm.

--
Steve
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Old 03-07-2007, 12:01 AM posted to triangle.gardens
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Default Tomato (and pepper) Hornworms




Sevin dust.


--
John


Liquid sevin is what I heard. The powder is being picked up/
killing bees.

FWIW

Craig
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Old 03-07-2007, 03:43 AM posted to triangle.gardens
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Default Tomato (and pepper) Hornworms

Yes.
The bees bring the dust grains back to the hive in the pollen baskets
on their hind legs, and then the Sevin dust wipes the whole hive out.
Bees need all the friends they can get these days.

Be sure to spray the liquid in the evening, if possible, when the
pollinators are less likely to be active.
Bt is effective for tomato fruit worm as well.

Use any pesticides, organics or otherwise, as sparingly as possible so
as to encourage the parasitic wasps to regain their balance and do
their job

On Jul 2, 6:01 pm, Craig Watts
wrote:
Sevin dust.


--
John


Liquid sevin is what I heard. The powder is being picked up/
killing bees.

FWIW

Craig





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Old 19-07-2007, 08:12 PM posted to triangle.gardens
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Default Tomato (and pepper) Hornworms

Just as an update...

I checked the plants in the morning and at night. Spent the next week
finding/killing 2-3 a day. Went to Southern States and purchased a BT
concentrate. I've done two treatments at this point...a week apart.

No further infestation for over a week.

--
John

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