First up though, a big thank you to everyone who contributed to our Blog & Tell over the weekend, I received over 50 home beauty recipes & I’m seriously so excited to try them! If you have a sec it’d be worth your while to peruse the comments…there’s some darn good ones in there that you probably already have in your pantry. Soooo, the randomly chosen winner of the $25 Sephora giftcard is…Yayy! If you’re SkateHop please email me at natasha@littlepinkmonsters.com with your address so I can mail your giftcard to you. Oh, and give me a few days to run to the mall to pick it up, I’ve been wanting an excuse to hit the American Apparel kid’s clothes anyway. (:
So here’s what that title is all about. Yesterday I was sipping my coffee staring off into the backyard when I noticed that my tomato plant looked funny. It looked naked.
I went outside and saw the biggest, squishiest, greediest caterpillar EVER.
At first it was kind of neat because does he (I’m assuming it’s a ‘he’, no caterpillar balls could be seen or anything) not look exactly like Eric Carle’s The Very Hungry Caterpillar?!
Then it set that he had eaten EVERY SINGLE LEAF & TOMATO that was on my 3′ tall plant. Grrr, I’m not a good gardener & this vegetable box the girl’s & I planted at the beginning of summer was quite an accomplishment. I was so intrigued by this obese green jellyroll however that my anger soon dissipated. At least I had contributed to a beautiful butterfly.
Or not.
According to Google this fatty was going to be a SPINX MOTH. ACK!
By the afternoon he had worked his way through my entire eggplant & I’d had enough. I relocated him & a little baby green caterpillar to a random giant weed on the side of the house. I’m hoping I can at least use his massive appetite for good.
Hope your weekend was great, I promise an update on the buns tomorrow, I just need to edit the video!
Vanesa
OMG GROSs!!! We had the same problem with our tomato plant! grrrr!
Meghan Flynn
I had that on my tomato plant as well! I accidentally discovered him when I touched him. I was moving my tomato plant upright so when I grabbed the plant I grabbed him. Gross!!!
Kelsie
That’s a tomato hornworm! Ehow.com has good tips for getting rid of them!
Maile
Love this post! I think is hilarious that you called the caterpillar both obese and rude 🙂 Love your blog, keeps me laughing!
Jacinta
eeek! The caterpillar doesn’t bother me at all, but that MOTH!!! Gah insects with hair FREAK ME OUT!!! Insects are NOT meant to have hair!! I can handle snakes, mice, spiders, slugs, snails even vomit or poo I am not squeamish at all but if I see an insect with hair!!! AHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!
Natasha
Omgosh, that’s hysterical and SO TRUE! ICK!
Sarah Kelly
Hornworms are nasty! We have an organic greenhouse and these guys destroyed both of our tomato plants and a tomatillo bush. They are evil little suckers! After I pried a bunch of them off with a pair of huge tweezers and killed them, I discovered the small ones can be fed to my daughter’s bearded dragon. So next time they will atleast serve a purpose and be dragon dinner.
Mindy
holy crap that’s fricken disgusting! It’s still irking me out and it looks unreal! Update us on waht it turns into though, haha.
Jessica
We had the same problem in our garden! We had 4 of those nasty boogers on our 3 tomato plants and we were only able to save a single tomato. Luckily they didn’t like out jalapenos.
Christy
Bast@rd! Aww man I’d be pissed at that big boy!!
Courtney
I had 4 of these guys on my green pepper plants last summer and they ate through them in a weekend when we were out of town! I noticed one on the Friday before we left and wasn’t sure what it was but didn’t think it could do any damage…yea, wrong. Then there were 4 (he told his friends) proudly munching away on the short stalks when we came home Sunday night. Disgusting! Thanks for posting – totally related this post and all of your others!
Tiffany
My mom had a huge caterpillar like that but it ate our peppers. And these peppers the ones that would probably make you cry if you tried to finish a whole one.
Nicole G.
I had one of these eat one of my tomato plants completely overnight and I was devastated. I pulled that stupid thing off my plant and marched it right over to my neighbor’s chickens. It was pretty fun watching them fight for a peck at it, plump and juicy. I did end up feeling slightly guilty since it reminded me of Hiemlich from Bug’s Life and I love Hiemlich. But, I never had another issue with tomato worms.
Natasha
Wow, you sent a MESSAGE!
Carrie
Symbolically, the moth is a sign of good luck in the middle east so who knows you may have something good coming your way 🙂
Jennifer
Wow its huge!
Natasha
I know, right?!?! SO CREEPY.