09/02/2026
There is a particular sound a gardener makes on finding the first one. Half the tomato plant stripped overnight, and there, thick as a finger and green as the leaves it ate, the tomato hornworm. Most of them are dead ten seconds later. Squashed, drowned, flung over the fence.
Here is what the flinging hand does not know. That worm is halfway to being one of the most astonishing animals your garden hosts. Left alone, it becomes the five-spotted hawkmoth, a heavy dusk flier that hovers in front of flowers on a blur of wings and drinks on the wing. People see one at the nicotiana at twilight and swear they saw a hummingbird. The moth works the night shift the bees leave empty, and the deep-throated flowers, the moonflowers and four-o-clocks, depend on it.
The tomatoes still need defending. So pick the worm off and walk it to a w**d patch instead of the bird bath. And if you find one wearing little white cocoons like grains of rice, leave it exactly where it is. Those are braconid wasps finishing a job you want finished.
The monster eating your tomatoes is a hummingbird in the making. Fling accordingly. 🍅
