Horned Tomato Worm: Master of Disguise

by John Cannizzo

The New York Botanical Garden invited me to talk to their horticultural therapy class. I asked Liza, the intern from Bailey Holt House, and Tracey, who lives there, to come with me to talk about their garden.

I was feeling good about myself for having seen into things a bit more deeply than others. Some students have an urge to find a tangible hero, a superior person or wise person or a leader or a father figure. When this happens it is the most natural thing in the world to start to believe it about your self. Also everybody else starts to expect it from you.

That is how temples get built to little tin gods with incense burning in front of them. That is why it is important for our interns to work with as many instructors as possible. Teachers have to beware of the danger of falling victim to one of these collective images -- becoming one-sided, one-dimensional. The danger lies not only in becoming a father mask, but in being overpowered by this mask when it is worn by others.

He is a master of disguise; he is a thief that will steal your most prized possession. He can disappear like a magician and when he reappears it will be in a totally different form. Manduca sexta, “Horned Tomato Worm." He is not really a worm at all, but a caterpillar.

Tracey called me that morning to tell me that they were infesting the roof top. Actually, this cousin of the Horned Tobacco Worm lives a very difficult life. Hunted by man, preyed upon by parasitic braconid wasps, few reach to become five-spotted hawk moths.

Before I got there Tracey had, in an act of desperation, been throwing them from the roof. I picked a big fat one off, leaf and all, and put him into a container. When we got to the NYBG horticultural therapy class I told the students what kind of worm it was and asked them a question. “What would you do with the caterpillars after taking them off a tomato plant?"

After the class I met my wife, Pam, and my daughters, Claire and Julia, at the park. We were drinking wine and eating pizza with another couple when I suddenly remembered the worm. The kids were totally taken by him. When I asked Pam the question she answered without hesitating. “Put him on the tomato plant that is on our roof. It isn't doing very well anyway. Of course she was right.

*All photos by John Cannizzo

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The Horned Tomato Worm is not really a worm at all. He is a caterpillar. Camouflaged as he is, he is very difficult to spot. He and his cousins were living among the tomatoes at Bailey Holt for days and weren't spotted until the damage that they had done was apparent.

The elusive Horned Tomato Worm is clearly visible when covered with the eggs of the braconid wasp. The eggs are attached by a silky thread. Life is difficult for this Worm, hated by humans and made a host of by wasps. When Tracey told me that they were throwing the caterpillars from the roof I felt a pang of sympathy for the repulsive creatures.

The braconid wasp is the natural enemy of the Horned Tomato Worm. She lays her eggs on the Worm and when they hatch they feed on the living Worm.

Those Horned Tomato Worms that survive this horrible fate borrow under the ground and emerge later when they have completed their transformation into the splendid 5 Spotted Hawk Moths.