Our scouts had seen signs. Chewed leaves, frass. We have learned in earlier campaigns not to take them lightly. Launched our best night patrol about 2100, crawled through the wire armed to the teeth. One strong black light at the recommended 365 nm wavelength and another experimental model with 21 LED's but longer wavelength, 395 nm. A backup tactical Nitecore white light for emergency land navigation.
Encountered enemy in only minutes. Contact, contact! Their snipers lit up like beacons with the 365 light. Picked them off and dropped them into soapy water. No mercy was even considered. They deserved none; got none. The bigger, sexier 395 light with the oversized head was all promise and no delivery. Barely could make out the enemy combatants, even at point blank range. The bastards just didn’t glow strongly enough when hiding in dense foliage. Packed it away and continued the search and destroy mission.
This morning, in the cold light of day, laid out the fallen troops for a grim body count. Some were small, probably still in training, while others were larger than my index finger, huge Sergeant Major Mother Worms capable of legendary destruction.
Late this afternoon, I'll go back out and spray with BT, tops and undersides of all leaves, especially up in the triple canopy. That should help against any overlooked juvenile recruits. I plan another night picking patrol this weekend. Might need to follow that with Spinosad, depending on our field intelligence reports. Vigilance is the price of liberty!
by NPKzone8a
12 Comments
Link? I want to buy the correct light
God dang you had an invasion. I only had to yeet two of these this year
This PROSE, I can’t! Love you for this.
Thank you for your service! You have done your part in propagating freedom for our plants and a hero’s parade is warranted for valor in the fields. I would have surely died. In fact, I have pulled plants before because I just couldn’t deal with the enemy! They are so gross!
This made me chuckle. Good job finding them!
I shuddered just looking at them!
Holy cow! That’s a lot of those little bastards.
Find a spider web that is occupied.
Too bad you don’t know anybody with chickens. They would be awesome pest control.
How many plants?
lol on top of being a great hornworm sniper, you’re a great writer OP!
Brutal, but wonderfully named invasion!