We are so sad. We went away for a week vacation and found most of our tomatoes have been nibbled on. This is our first time growing tomatoes, Cherokee Purple and San Marzano. We went to bed and woke up this morning and found the rest of our CP were nibbled on (first photo- we took them off the vine for the photo and to throw away). We are in north Texas. Any idea what this is could be and what to do?
by cairuhlain
26 Comments
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Mine too!! Someone help 😭
Physical barriers are the only thing that keep mammals out.
It’s birds! They are going for the moisture.
Looks like groundhog to me! But it could be deer. Physical barrier is required.
This year the birds have been bad- pecking my tomatoes then hollowing them out.
I have found that rubber toy snakes (realistic looking) have nearly solved the issue. I place them around the plants and if you have pots, you can wrap the snake around the plant and the pot to deter them from wanting to hop into the pots or land on the plants.
I found the rubber snakes at Walmart for just over $1 each, in the toy section. Great investment you can use year after year.
Birds also don’t like reflective things so you can try putting garden decorations out, or even things such as owl statues. Other than a physical barrier , you have to get a little creative and hope you can outsmart them.
I use the cheap dollar store chilli powder around my tomato plants for the ground hogs and squirrels, for the birds putting out a bird bath near the garden seems to help.
No it’s not. It’s only eating half.
Whatever it is, it wants water, not food. Start putting out water for the animals. Use mosquito dunks or change the water frequently
Add some water sources (not deep enough to drown in) to the garden. If it’s not raining enough, the animals may be thirsty and going for the gel around the tomato seeds.
I had to break down and cover with the XL tree insect netting.
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It’s my toddler. At least that’s what’s half eating my green tomatoes 🫠🫠
It’s a critter not a bug. Maybe a rat?
This has been my tomato life for the past 2 years, and I anticipate it this year, too. I’ve tried chili powder and pepper flakes. I’ve put chicken wire around them. None of this worked at all. I put out a few bird baths this year to test the “animals are just thirsty” hypothesis. The most irritating part is they don’t finish a tomato. I’d sacrifice one or two if they left the rest alone, but they take one or two bites from all of them! My next step is paying my 18yo to stay up all night with the BB gun and patrol the backyard. I don’t know if it’s chipmunks, birds, squirrels, or even rats (I suspect the latter two).
Good luck!
In my experience birds leave a few pecks, squirrels pull fruit off the vine and only take a few bites but rats actually eat most of the fruit and often leave it on the vine. Your pictures look like rats to me.
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Looks like mine. Groundhogs
My guess is deer, especially if the tomatoes were up higher on the plant. They were destroying every garden I had that wasn’t behind a six foot fence. Year before last, my husband built fences around all of my beds, and though the deer still get leaves and the occasional fruit that pokes out over or through the fence, the damage is maybe 5% of what it was pre-fence. It’s so annoying, because they’d take a bite or two out of a fruit, then move to another and another. They did the same on my cucumbers, just munching randomly as they went along. They will also eat the actual plants, which is really frustrating.
If the fruit is lower on the plant, could be a groundhog, or even a bunny if they could get it from their hind legs. One year I had a turtle who would raid my dwarf plants!
But regardless, a good fence is about the only thing that will truly keep critters out. I’d tried everything I could think of to avoid having to invest in a fence, but finally it became clear that was the only way I’d be able to have a garden that I don’t lose half of.
Rats, squirrels, or birds. It’s one of those I bet.
Racoons possums, squirrels, rats…etc.
It doesn’t look like bird damage, and it’s too much damage for that. Also squirrels are not out at night. Maybe some kind of rodent, especially if the damaged fruits are low on the plants.
I use mint spray around my plants to keep rats and mice away.
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Rats, possums… 😭
That definitely looks like a rat to me.
I cover my garden every year-we get rats at night that eat the whole tomato. And they are very clever. I can lose an occasional tomato, but every single one makes me see red.
Birds also like to peck in each one and squirrels are known thieves as well.
For us it’s not water-we’ve had plenty of rain and a pool to boot.
I have to use landscape staples along the bottom of the netting to keep it tight against the ground. It takes about a month for the rats to figure it out. Then I continually check around the bottom as they have figured out how the can pull up the netting.
I hate using the netting as it makes weeding and harvesting a pain in the butt. Also, one must be cautious of watches, necklaces, and hair accessories-I’ve gotten stuck in my netting on multiple occasions.
But it’s necessary or I’ll lose all my hard earned maters!
This is what I use and it lasted several seasons:
OGORI 25′ x 50′ Bird Netting… https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07FFY1TYG?ref=ppx_pop_mob_ap_share
this is something it’s you
Rats. Squirrels usually take the fruit off the vine, take a couple bites out of it, then leave it on a fence post and go back for another. Rats usually gnaw tomatoes while still on the vine.
We use stainless steel mesh gopher bags wrapped around the trusses and secured with a couple of clothes pins. They’re designed to keep pocket gophers from eating the roots of transplanted shrubs. The 2 to 5 gallon sizes work best.
They work in most, but not all cases. We use them for cantaloupe and winter squash, too.
In the same bought but it is only eating the almost ripe tomatoes. Setting up a few traps. Apparently it doesn’t like ripe cantaloupe so placing tomatoes in it now