hawk moth

[annietomatomad]

Just found this moth resting on a tree near my tomatoes. It looked like it was spent and probably just finished laying eggs. I have a suspicion I will be seeing tomato hormworms in a few weeks. Arghh....


What to do, what to do? Good thing my plants are all going strong and will probably survive the hungry cats.

Cheers, Annie

[Granny]

Did you see if you could ID the moth? You got an excellent shot of it.

[annietomatomad]

Here's the same moth, different angle:


Think it's a five spotted hawk moth but I'm not 100% sure.

Cheers, Annie

[Tomstrees]

I just found your moths cousin this morning...
He's now on the "horn-worm" relocation program ...

~ Tom

ps. I've never seen destruction like this one did ... had to have been chowin allllll night to do what he did ...

[tomatoaddict]

That moth is creepin' me out. I have never seen one that big.
The hairs on my neck and arms are standing up just looking at it.

[annietomatomad]

I know tomatoaddict! I was a little bit freaked out too when I first saw it. It's as big as a hummingbird (no wonder the name). And no wonder the cats get so large too. I'm just worried for my plants. Hope they survive the cats.

[annietomatomad]

So here's a picture of part of my devastated Sungold (I wouldn't have been so merciless if this cat had chosen to eat some other variety--he even chowed down on the fruit!!):


Here he is eating the fruit:


Taken off and about to be set free on the street:



I'm wondering how many more are going to appear in the next few days. Have to be hyper vigilant.

Cheers, Annie

[svalli]

My son likes to collect the hornworms and feed them tomato leaves in a jar, with some sand on the bottom. We have been able to see some of them emerge as moths a year later.






We have also grown and released some Monarchs. I purposely left weeds, which the cats eat, to grow by the garden fence.




Last summer we found Black Swallowtail cats on the dill. Now I let dill grow also as weed just for them.

[annietomatomad]

Wow svalli, those are gorgeous pictures. I'll have to start a project for my kids with the next one I find (I was too upset with finding it chomping on the fruit to let it live this time).

Thanks for sharing.

Cheers, Annie

[svalli]

I used to sprinkle BT powder on my tomato plants at first sight of hornworm damage, but now our son does not let me do it anymore. I usually have a lot of plants so little chomping does not bother me.

If you collect the hornworms, keep them in a container, which is covered with netting or something else, which prevents them from escaping. The cats are happy as long as you add tomato leaves daily while they are growing, but when they get ready to pupate, they will get anxious and are looking a place to dig into. First time we grew some, I did not know that they pupate underground, so the cats escaped from the open container and were moving pretty fast on the living room floor. Next time we put about two inches of sand on the bottom of the container and the cats burrowed under it to pupate. The cats do get ugly brown color and look almost like they would be rotting before they form the cocoon.

Growing caterpillars and seeing how they turn to butterflies and moths is really good project for the kids to teach them to appreciate things in nature.