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This is the first time I’ve ever seen this happening in the Test Gardens and it’s a sign of healthy biodiversity. In the first picture, this is a Tobacco Hornworm, the larval or caterpillar stage of a Carolina Sphinx Moth’s (Manduca sexta) life cycle. Tobacco Hornworms if not caught early can cause a lot of destruction to a Tomato plant and ruin your planned harvests. A Tobacco Hornworm can grow up to four inches long and be as thick as a thumb. The worst part is they can grow to those big sizes very rapidly, a Tobacco Hornworm can reach full size in three to four weeks and this varies based on the weather and availability of food. In our area they tend to be a summer problem as the larva emerges from the soil in late July through August, takes its adult form, then they mate, and lay eggs on your prized Tomato plants. It is possible to see up to three separate generations of Tobacco Hornworms in a given year in our state so they are a serious problem. Just so we’re clear, a Tobacco Hornworm is not the same thing as a Tomato Hornworm; they might both attack Tomatoes, but they are the larva of two different Moths. There are two ways to tell the caterpillars apart, the first is a mnemonic, if it has “Seven lucky stripes, Lucky Strikes, Tobacco Hornworm” and, Eight V’s, V8 Juice, Tomato Hornworm”. An alternative way to be sure is to look at the horn on the rear of the Caterpillar, if it’s reddish in color it’s a Tobacco Hornworm, whereas if the horn is blue, black or dark green it’s a Tomato Hornworm. Also keep in mind that the Tomato Hornworm is the larval stage of a different moth, the Five-spotted Hawk Moth (Manduca quinquemaculata). In the picture, you can see bunch of little white things on the Tobacco Hornworm, and that’s where the biodiversity comes in. Those little white cotton swab looking things are the cocoons of the Braconid Wasp (Cotesia congregata).