Attack of the Killer Wasp Babies

I've mentioned hornworms before and provided pictures, but those hornworms were healthy (until I picked them off and threw them into the sun for the birds, stomped them, hit them with a dropped rock, or placed them in a spiderweb). I haven't seen any healthy hornworms in the garden for a little while, and the picture at left provides some evidence for why that may be so.

This hornworm is dead. See the little white things hanging all over its body? Those are the parasitic wasp eggs I have mentioned. You can't tell from this picture, but these eggs were actually wriggling when I took this shot. See the brown marks all over the hornworm? Those are where other egg sacs were attached; then the wasp babies actually hatched and breakfasted upon Mr. Hornworm.

When you see a hornworm with wasp egg sacs, you are supposed to leave it, so I did. Feed on, little babies!

The Downside of Gardening: Bugs

The tomato hornworm has to be the creepiest caterpillar I have ever seen. I love wooly worms; in fact, when I see them, I crouch down and pet them, feeling their soft prickly backs. There is something very cute about these wriggly little ground teddies. (They remind me of bears for some reason.)

The tomato hornworm is the exact opposite. It has no fur, just white lines on its smooth green hide that look almost like creases (I try not to get close enough to find out for sure), or perhaps even war paint. They have a little red spiky cowlick on their rear end; the front end looks eyeless (again, I'm not going to get close enough to find out). What is most horrifying about this worm is the combination of its seeming eyelessness and its teethy mouth. [shiver] These things give me nightmares. They remind me of the sandworms in the movie Dune. And yet, to get them off the plant, I have to pick them off, and I'm always afraid that I'm going to squeeze too hard (they grip the tomato plant stems strongly, and are hard to dislodge) and be rewarded with a handful of green goo.

Earlier in the season I found about 5 and blogged about them; yesterday, I picked 6 off my tomato plants and threw them far into the yard in the sun, hoping that, like vampires, they would turn to ash in the sunlight or, even better, be spied and eaten by birds. I like birds. I don't mind feeding them. Today, I found this one and one other. Back to the hornworms in a moment.

Another creepy bug that I have battled before (clearly to no avail) is the Japanese Beetle. They are once again (or still, I'm not sure which) copulating in my greenery; unfortunately, this time they have picked my okra plants as their conjugal beds.

If you look closely, you'll see we have a couple of stray beetles who have either just finished having sex, are about to have sex, or have no interest in sex; you have a couple in the lower right caught in the act, and upon an even closer inspection, you'll see a buggy menage a troi happening in the upper left of the leaf. The only thing worse than thinking about bug sex is imagining one's parents doing it. [shiver]

And now, back to the hornworms. The only good hornworm in my book is a dead one--or one with parasitic wasp egg sacs all over its body, which will soon hatch and eat the worm. Second best is a hornworm that is about to become spider food.

I know spiders are good for the garden, but this one--a wolf spider, maybe? I don't know--is too big for my comfort. I've never really cared for spiders, and the bigger they are, the less I care for them. I have to pick okra around this sucker somehow. [shiver] It does make me wonder, too, if this monster is living in my okra, are there others about? Just thinking about that is giving me goosebumps and making my skin crawl.

I'd feel kind of sorry for the grasshopper, who was apparently dinner, but he's kind of creepy, too, all wrapped up in his spiderweb blanket, his arms across his chest as if he were lying in state in an invisible casket.

Lessons I Learned in the Garden...So Far

I am learning a lot about gardening this year. For instance, I have learned that rabbits can get into and poop in your garden through fairly small fence holes. Not that I'm complaining about the rabbit poo, because it makes fantastic fertilizer. And they really aren't eating the beans any more--I think the plants have gotten to tough for the bunny palate.

I have learned that weeds grow faster than plant, and that I really need to mulch before the weeds take hold.

I have learned not to plant cucumbers near any other plants, because they will spread wildly and choke them out.

I have learned to plant herb seeds directly into the soil instead of trying to start seedlings and transplant them. All of my herb transplants died.

I have learned that hornworms and slugs are really disgusting, especially when you harvest zucchini and smash a slug with your hand in the process. They turn into slimy brown goo, no matter how small.

I have learned that if I go away for vacation, even for just a few days, I will have a hellish harvest when I return. Which is what I am dealing with today. Here are today's harvest figures:

• 8 zucchini (one was too large to include in the picture);
  
• 1 white onion and 1 puny yellow onion (these were testers so I could see how large they are getting);
  
• some dill;
  
• 17 cucumbers; and
  
• 60 sun sugar tomatoes

Next year, I will keep track of harvests in weight instead of number of items, which will give me a different way of calculating my harvest success. Meanwhile, I need to be thinking about what I will plant soon for fall harvest.

TOTAL PRODUCE COUNT TO DATE:
Zucchini: 69
Cucumbers: 58
White Onions: 1
Yellow Onions: 1
Sun Sugar Tomatoes: 108

Cucumbers at Last!

Harvested 9 cucumbers this evening, with the promise of more in just a day or two. It's time to break out the freezer bread-and-butter pickle and the marinated cucumber recipes. Add to the cukes 4 more zucchini and 23 sun sugar tomatoes and a few sprigs of dill for today's total harvest.

Note: I will be spending the evening shredding zucchini for freezing until my arms fall off. At least I can do it while I watch So You Think You Can Dance.

Hornworm update: Upon investigation, hubby and I spied two more hornworms this evening, which met certain death. I plucked them and David stomped the first one.

Those two hornworms stripped the leaves from several tomato stems, and one of them was cheeky enough to eat one of the green tomatoes. It looked like he had been pretty darn hungry, because as you can see, a little more than half of the tomato is gone (with a big pile of what I can only assume is hornworm poo --not shown--globbed up where a couple of stems bifurcate). For his blasphemy, he was killed with a large rock and, five minutes later, had become bird food.

It looks like I will be on hornworm patrol daily now if I want any tomatoes.