Sphinx of tomatos
The Manduca quinquemaculata L. is a lépidoptère of the family Sphingidae which one finds on the American continent, whose caterpillar is a devastating cultures of Solanacée S, in particular the tomato. It is called sphinx of the tomatos in its form Imago (butterfly).
Description
It is a night butterfly with the large body grisâtre which measures 10-12 cm of scale from one wing to another. The adult is often confused with his close relative, the Sphinx of the tobacco, which lives in the south-eastern areas of the continent.The caterpillar is 10 cm long and it is of a color green-blue. It is also characterized by 7 or 8 white lines which form a V on its back and a reddish spine on its posterior. It is this remarkable but inoffensive spine which gives to the sphinx tomatos its nickname of “ tomato hornworm ” in English.
Its voracious appetite for the sheets and sometimes the fruits of the Tomato S, the Eggplant S and the Poivron S explains the other part of its common noun. Known for its incredible capacity of defoliation, proportional to its size, the sphinx of tomatos is regarded as a plague of the garden.
Biological cycle
An adult sphinx of tomatos lays round and green eggs, one by one, under the sheets of a tomato at the beginning of spring. The caterpillars start to eat as of their blossoming in summer, thus continuing during a month before leaving the plant for the ground. They then dig a burrow a depth from 10 to 15 cm in the ground and are locked up there in a brown Cocon from 45 to 60 mm length in which they spend the winter by completing their development.There is only one generation of sphinx of tomatos per annum.
Enemies
The sphinx of tomatos has also many natural enemies.For example, there exists a type of Guêpe parasite which lays its eggs on the back of these caterpillars, practices fatal for those. A caterpillar of sphinx of tomatos parasitized by this wasp often presents projections in the shape of outgoing cocoon of its back and must be left alive on the plant so that the wasps, while éclosant, can parasitize the other caterpillars.
The Oiseau X are also natural enemies of the sphinges of tomatos.
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