Striped armyworms are back.

[gorbelly]

*sigh*. They showed up around this time last year.

The damage to foliage is still relatively low, although inefficient and ugly (ruining bits and pieces of many leaves and leaving scars instead of eating the leaves cleanly). No damage to fruit yet, but last year, they did leave typical caterpillar feeding damage on some fruit. Last year's damage was minor but not negligible.

Now I have to decide whether to spray spinosad or see whether the wasps and birds can keep them under control. I always see wasps of many kinds scouting around my tomato plants, and most wasps that we see are caterpillar predators, aren't they, whether it's through parasitism or just going in there, taking them apart, and carrying them off?

I would probably feel less precious about my tomatoes if ANY of them had !@#&*$#% ripened at all at this point (and I'd gotten to eat any of them) instead of just taunting me on the vine with their gigantic swollen green promises.

[clkeiper]

Spray the spinosad for pity's sake. those worms will destroy the foliage/fruit and you won't get fruit again...

[gorbelly]

Originally Posted by clkeiper

Spray the spinosad for pity's sake. those worms will destroy the foliage/fruit and you won't get fruit again...

They're not massing on my plants or anything, which I would take care of right away. After their massing stage but while still small, they disperse on the wind so don't build up huge numbers on plants. Damage was slow-progressing last year; they're not hornworms. I have some time to consider what to do. By the time they blow in on plants, Bt is probably not that effective on them any longer. AFAIK, spinosyns will still work, even when they're larger.

Even in more southern states, it is not always a pest. It has a very large number of predators, parasitoids, and fungal and viral pathogens. These mortality agents are present in the landscape, so conservation of natural enemies, by limiting insecticides as much as possible, may be the most effective biological control.
http://extension.psu.edu/plants/vege...orm-management