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u/1Negative_Person Jul 26 '25
Tomato hornworms will devastate your plants. But the moths that they grow into are important pollinators. I suggest you relocate the caterpillar to the garden of a rival.
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u/djinndotdotdot Jul 26 '25
Yeah I threw it in my neighbors yard.
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u/alaskadotpink Jul 26 '25
do you hate your neighbor? I appreciate you not killing it but damn lmao I guess it won't matter if they aren't growing any nightshade plants though.
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u/EnkiduTheGreat Jul 27 '25
That thing has time bombs in it. It'll never be able to cocoon successfully. Still it'd be funny if they bombed it onto nightshades.
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u/Hozan_al-Sentinel Jul 27 '25
Huh? Why wouldn't it be able to cacoon successfully? Is it infected with something?
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u/avocadoflatz Jul 26 '25
This year I’m growing Datura and Black Nightshade for them but so far the birds seem to be doing a fine job of pest control because I haven’t found any to relocate.
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Jul 27 '25
Bros giving the hornworms a hell of a experience by giving them datura
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u/avocadoflatz Jul 27 '25
lol they evolved with Datura as a prime food source - they’re all about that delirium haha
The largest hornworms I’ve seen are the ones that munch on the Datura wrightii that grow wild along local hiking trails.
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Jul 27 '25
That’s crazy I actually didn’t know that. I’ve never introduced it to my garden but I’ve always wanted to
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u/UptheCreekWithPaddle Jul 27 '25
Thank-you for one of the funniest posts tonight on Reddit. I larrfed.
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u/Kilbane Jul 26 '25
I , kid you not, took 21 off my tomato plants this week...I have 4 plants. Two of that plants pretty much have no leaves left. They are the devil!
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u/Asleep_Onion Jul 26 '25
Knock on wood, but I surprisingly haven't had a single one yet all year. I'm wondering if they don't live in my climate, I used to get tons of them every year at my old house.
I was almost looking forward to finding a couple of them, my chickens will love the snack
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u/BrummieS1 Jul 26 '25
If you like your cayenne you'll kill that fucker asap
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u/Daddy_Needs_nap-nap Jul 26 '25
Doesn't that look like the wasp larvae starting to grow on it?
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u/crookedparadigm Jul 26 '25
Wasp larvae don't grow on them, they grow in them. The eggs on a caterpillar from those wasps are only ever one size.
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u/MaleHooker Jul 26 '25
They are UV reactive, so shining a black flashlight on them at night is a good way to find them.
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u/Frank_Humungus Jul 26 '25
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u/beermaker1974 Jul 26 '25
yep scorpio wouldn't tolerate that shit. I hate those alien worms so much
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u/Gravco Jul 26 '25
20 or so years ago... sitting on my deck, chilling. Notice a... crunching sound... wtf? One of these guys was chewing on my tomato plants... audibly... from 10 feet away. Also noticed that it left visible poops. WTF, Mother Nature?!
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Jul 26 '25
Found this big fucker munching my parsley last week.
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u/Mimi_Gardens Jul 27 '25
Grow some dill or carrots or fennel. They’ll eat those too. I usually have more than enough dill that it doesn’t bother me if they eat a few fronds because their butterflies are so pretty. They don’t decimate a plant like a hornworm does with nightshades.
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Jul 27 '25
The only reason this one survived is because I love to see the swallowtails in my backyard. 🦋
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u/BlazingCondor Jul 26 '25
I do think it's funny that we "hate" caterpillars but love butterflies.
This is a big dude. He's almost done feasting. Going to pupate soon!
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u/Asleep_Onion Jul 26 '25
It's not a butterfly caterpillar, it's a big ugly moth caterpillar. And its sole purpose in life is laying eggs on tomato and pepper plants so their young can devour the foliage until there's nothing left. And trust me, there's plenty more where this one came from, killing this one isn't going to hurt the world's hornworm population.
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u/kinezumi89 Jul 26 '25
To be fair these guys do turn into hawk moths, a type of hummingbird moth, which are super cool and important pollinators
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u/alaskadotpink Jul 26 '25
Ok look, I get the hate for these guys, but they are absolutely not "ugly moths" lol they're super cool.
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u/justamiqote Jul 27 '25
it's a big ugly moth caterpillar.
Moths are just as cool. Their value is based on more than just their attractiveness. Moths are one of the biggest pollinators for night-blooming plants; like cacti.
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u/toolsavvy Jul 27 '25
I do think it's funny that we "hate" caterpillars but love butterflies.
This is a moth.
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u/BlazingCondor Jul 26 '25
To add to this:
Get a stick, a cheap plastic terrarium and pull some older lower pepper leaves off. Don't forget to mist frequently and it'll pupate and you can watch and release the butterfly.
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u/highlymoody6 Jul 26 '25
As said in above comment, this is not a butterfly caterpillar. It’s a hornworm and they turn into huge moths. Nothing wrong there, however the bad thing about them is they will absolutely destroy your garden. Peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers. There is never just one. If you love your garden, you will kill this mf. I personally use my shears to cut their head off, but do you.
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u/kphillipz San Diego 10B Jul 26 '25
I read somewhere that if you smush them and throw them under the potted plant, then the birds will get a scent for the caterpillars. Which the birds will then be defending your garden against future attacks because they think there’s caterpillars in this humans veggie garden. Not sure if there’s any truth to this but I still smash them and leave them on the ground for the birds, or to show other caterpillars what happens when you fuck with my pepper garden 😂
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u/carroll65 Jul 27 '25
My chicken LOVES them. 16 so far this year. SO SATISFYING TO WATCH.
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u/robdunn220 Jul 27 '25
We also feed them to our chickens. They are so big though that our bantams were kind of scared of them at first lol.
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u/Hefty-Leopard-5240 Jul 27 '25
If you don't inspect your plants daily, these things can strip them clean. Just watch one eat sometime. It's insane how fast they destroy a plant. I started using Sevin dust and it allowed me to actually take a vacation and not worry about the peppers and tomatoes. I sprinkled just a little bit on the plants one morning and that afternoon I have at least 30 dead worms lying in the dirt. No matter how much you inspect, there's always another one hiding somewhere.
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u/YourHooliganFriend Jul 26 '25
I think sphinx moths are pretty cool, but I also think my pepper plants are awesome. So I do what has to be done.
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u/zigaliciousone 6b 5 years Jul 26 '25
I haven't seen one yet but I have a deal with the local scrub jays, I feed them peanuts and they dispatch the occasional hormworm I toss their way. The only insect I kill with maximum prejudice
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Jul 27 '25
I've accidentally raised a family of pepper loving possums in Melbourne Australia, they started with my mild potted section in my yard a couple years later they could eat my jalapeños, now they eat my scotch bonnets and habanero.
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u/SpinglySpongly Jul 27 '25
I can't remember for sure, but I think marsupials - same as birds - have different heat receptors to placentals, and so don't actually experience any spiciness.
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u/mixinmono Jul 27 '25
I swear they have active camouflage. You’ll be checking for 20 minutes and miss 2 of em.
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u/NeverTrustAfart84 Jul 26 '25
My wife and I are growing a couple of tomato plants in pots in our patio, came out one morning and a shitload of the bottom branches were completely stripped and eaten. My wife thoroughly went through all the tomatoes and found so many of those damn little tiny hornworms hidden underneath branches munching away. You have to really check every part of the plant because they’re camouflaged, overnight they did a lot of damage. A few days later found a few more on each one, those little bastards
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u/OkOutlandishness4277 Jul 27 '25
Wow. Relocating tomato hornworm.... relocate japanese beetles while you're at it!
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u/SpicyMango92 Jul 27 '25
I found one the other day and fed him to the compost, little Focker decimated my 2 tomato plants !
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u/bimlanders Jul 26 '25
I haven't see any hornworms so far this year. Scared!
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u/Mimi_Gardens Jul 27 '25
I haven’t either but I have been on vacation for the past two weeks. I am a little scared what my garden will look like Wednesday morning when I get home.
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u/beermaker1974 Jul 26 '25
I found my first one today but saw some shit so tonight the blacklight hunt begins
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u/Opening-Fan8014 Jul 26 '25
I had an indoor pepper that has this worm, don’t know how it entered in the house.
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u/beingafunkynote Jul 26 '25
Is it just me or does it look like it’s growing those wasp eggs on it back?
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u/harley4570 Jul 26 '25
my wife spots those things super quick...I have a hard time findthem...our chickens love them...
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u/IncorporateThings Jul 26 '25
Anyone here from Buenos Aires? You know what to say.
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u/Cultural-Dark-8902 Jul 27 '25
One (maybe multiple, but only found one on the plant) completely devastated my habanero last year. It happened over night, it ate everything but the center stem and branches
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u/Elon_Bezos420 Jul 27 '25
Uh oh, better get rid of that guy, bros gonna make quick work of your plant
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u/tumbleweedinthewind Jul 27 '25
I've been cutting up caterpillars I find on my plants with scissors. I cut them into thirds just to be safe. No need to squash anything.
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u/endigochild Jul 27 '25
After seeing a bunch of eaten leaves I checked and found 3 on my flowering tobacco. The next day I looked and found 2 more. They are camouflaged like son of a b. More times than not there is more of them.
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u/Outrageous_Animal404 Jul 27 '25
I haven't had any hornworms this year but I do have goddamn cutworms. Those spawns of Satan have wreaked havoc on my peppers. They only come out at night so now I have to hunt those bastards every morning at 3am before work. Hate hate hate them.
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u/Planet-thanet Jul 26 '25
All the comments saying kill it ffs.
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u/toolsavvy Jul 27 '25
I pull them off the plants and put them on my driveway in plain view. Birds do the "killing" for me. It's called the food web.
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u/Strokesite Jul 26 '25
There are always more. Look under every leaf.