Big, ugly, tomato-killing larva

[HudsonValley]

Went away for a few days and came home yesterday to find a badly wilted Cherokee Chocolate plant. Yanked the plant today, since it seemed hopeless, and found that an enormous larva had eaten half the roots! I'm guessing it's a cicada larva; I found a maroon-colored casing nearby.

Any idea how to kill its friends before they take out the rest of my plants? BT? GrubEx?

Here's a photo of the nasty critter, taken just before I sliced it in two (). The straw mulch at the top of the photo offers a sense of scale...

[carolyn137]

I think you are right about the cicadas.

https://www.google.com/search?q=cica...&bih=815&dpr=1

I also remember reading that they stay dormant in the soil and emerge from dormancy every maybe 15 to 20 years, but I didn't check that out.

Carolyn

[slugworth]

when I was a kid they called them the 17 year locust.

[Garden/Arborist]

A 25 cent piece in the photo would work great for scale. I pop the little buggers heads and return them to the soil when I find them.

[HudsonValley]

Originally Posted by Garden/Arborist

A 25 cent piece in the photo would work great for scale. I pop the little buggers heads and return them to the soil when I find them.

Agreed; my pockets were empty...



Some birds made a nice meal of the larva.