Friday, July 11, 2008

It's Amazing...


Nature is so Fascinating!


I have two tomato plants so of course I have the dreaded tomato hornworms. I have picked off three so far this season.


Those guys can strip a tomato plan in no time flat!


My Tennessee tomatoes are faring much better than the plants I had in Mississippi.


When I was living in Mississippi, commuting 2 hours a day, and working fulltime, my tomatoes would be totally stripped of foliage by the time I got home from work. I never did get a good harvest.


Now I am home more often (although less these past 10 days because of starting real estate training at Keller Williams), so I can keep an eye on them.


I was curious about where tomato hornworms came from (ugly buggers! and they are the same color as the tomato plant so they're hard to spot).


They are actually catepillars of a six-winged hawk moth! Who Knew? I sure didn't and neither did my mother, who probably picked zillions of hornworms off tomato plants during her childhood on the farm.


One of the three I picked off this season had weird white things sticking out of it...they made it a lot easier to see. I was curious about that, too, and learned from the internet that the white things are the eggs of a type of wasp that kill the hornworms!


Even though I'm at home more, I am glad to have some help getting rid of the hornworms!


Thank you, wasps!

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