Sunday, August 15, 2010

Yuck or Yum?





A couple of days ago, I picked our first tomato. Today I went up to water the plants and saw an interesting pattern of darks spots on the ground. Then I noticed that several of the tomato plants were half-eaten. The only culprit that would do such a thing is a tomato hornworm. I found one, then a bunch and yanked them off (they hold on tightly!). I dumped some on a red napkin for contrast and photographed them for your viewing pleasure. One is trying to escape to the upper right; he (she?) didn't make it. That spiny thingy is on the back end. And that other thing that looks like a tiny green hand grenade is caterpillar poop. Just in case you were wondering. The other pics can be used for ID purposes in case you have a problem in your garden. They're about four inches long! Clearly, mostly yuck. The yum factor? A wild food fan once told me that he liked to dip the worms (caterpillars of a sphinx moth, really) in batter and fry them up. Yum!

2 comments:

Greg Carr said...

Fried hornworms are yummy

Anonymous said...

I'm voting yuck! It doesn't matter how it tastes. I don't think I could get past the thought of eating bugs. Ewwww!!
You had tons of them in your garden! We have never had them THAT bad (crosses fingers)