How To Get Rid Of Spotted Tomato Hornworms On Your Tomato Plants

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Florida pusley is a low-branching, annual summer weed. Its pretty, white, star-shaped flowers produce an abundance of seeds, and a single plant can quickly turn into an infestation. This weed is extremely drought tolerant and can easily out compete lawns that are not irrigated during extended dry weather conditions.

Unlike other native shrubs and trees that have become the darlings of nationwide advertising campaigns, Florida anise-tree (Illicium floridanum) struggles to achieve widespread interest. This shade-adapted understory shrub can be found growing naturally in shaded, moist to wet areas where it can reach a compact height and width of 6 to 10 ft. The olive-green leaves are 2- to 6-inches long (reminiscent of rhododendron foliage) and release a fragrant anise scent when crushed.

Dr. Matt Cutulle reports, “I saw my first nutsedge plants this year pop up in the plastic mulch of a fellow researcher’s trial last week in Charleston. Soil temperatures in plastic mulch systems are going to be higher, which may lead to earlier sprouting of yellow nutsedge tubers. New tubers begin forming four to six weeks after a new shoot emerges. Individual nutsedge plants may eventually form patches 10 feet or more in diameter, thus it is important to practice field sanitation once an infestation is recognized.”

This is a Florida predatory stink bug (Euthyrhynchus floridanus) feeding on a species of plant-feeding stink bug. The photo shows the predator’s piercing/sucking mouthparts inserted into its prey.

I don’t grow C. florida in my current garden, but looking around here now since the snow receded and making my pruning list for the weeks ahead, I realize how many other dogwood species I do grow, and enjoy. The dogwood bloom season begins even before Forsythia, with Cornus mas (above), in April. A slideshow of it and some other reliable favorites.Use the thumbnails to toggle between slides, or hover your cursor on the middle of the right edge of the big photo to display navigational arrows. A list of dogwood profiles and other links is below the gallery. Enjoy

The tomato hornworm and tobacco hornworm both have angled white markings on their sides, but the tobacco hornworm’s seven marks just go in one direction, and the white is edged in black; the tomato hornworm’s eight marks per side are each more like a chevron, or “V,” with no black edge. The other big difference: Tobacco hornworms’ “horns” (which look like a tail) are usually reddish; the tomato hornworms’ are black or blue-black. (Oddly, I don’t have a photo of the tomato hornworm, but you can compare them on this University of Florida web page.)That University of Florida Entomology site has photos of the very similar-looking sphinx moths that each one becomes, too.I think the one just above was more recently “hatched,” because its body was still dark-colored, but I’m not certain. Maybe he’d just been smoking and got all sooty? (Kidding.) You can see all the life phases–caterpillar, chrysalis, sphinx moth–here.I have to say, I’m violent when one of these guys is eating my tomatoes in early summer, and it’s all “off with their heads” over here then. But in fall, as the garden un

I’m often asked that question, usually phrased like this: Why didn’t my (insert name of tomato variety) taste as good this year as last?Getting the best flavor from a tomato is “a matter of lining the genetics up with the environment,” says Tom Stearns, founder of High Mowing Organic Seeds. It’s something he acknowledges that people are more inclined to do with animals than plants—to choose a breed of l

Before I called Craig, I had searched in the Seed Savers Exchange database for tomato, and found more than 12,000 listings, not including the tiniest currant types or the many hybrids that Seed Savers doesn’t even focus on. How to choose–and how to make room for all the tomatoes we simply cannot resist?Craig is also cofounder of the Dwarf Tomato Project (those are some dwarf types sliced open up top), which gets back to the issue of how many tomatoes can be squeezed in,

Don’t worry: There won’t be a quiz at the end, where instead you can also share any tomato wisdoms of your own for our collective benefit.my 16 bits of tomato wisdom1. Start with a homegrown seedling (grow it like this) or a locally raised one—not a big-box-store seedling that may have been shipped in from warmer zones, where more tomato diseases are endemic and overwinter. (That logic isn’t tomato-specific; I buy local seedlings or g

All in time for World Carnivorous Plant Day on Wednesday, May 4th, we’re also going to learn about the plight of carnivorous plants in the wild, where they’re disproportionately endangered.Kenny Coogan is a board member and education director for the International Carnivorous Plant Society (which also has a popular group on Facebook). Kenny’s also author of the recent book “Florida’s Carnivorous Plants,” and he operates a carnivorous plant nursery there

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