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Tobacco Hornworm

Photo by NickiDeering
Published on Project Noah
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38.4365, -91.1743

Field Notes

Description:

Green worm, large, false eyes, spiked-top rear end (magenta spike), bulky body, fast moving, black & white stripe per body segment, 3 sets of utilitarian feet, 5 remaining pairs of feet are bulky with what looks like eyelashes that are used for holding on with.

Habitat:

Rural area/near wooded area

Notes:

Found on small red pepper plant (not sure which variety).

Species ID Suggestions

Tobacco Hornworm | Carolina sphinx

Manduca sexta

Comments (6)

Here's a quick way to tell them apart: Manduca sexta | tobacco hornworm | red tipped horn Manduca quinquemaculata | tomato hornworm | black tipped horn
I've also updated my previous spotting to tobacco hornworm after reexamining.
There were four worms of varying size on a small red pepper plant (I'm not certain which variety of red pepper).
It does look like a tobacco hornworm, from the other confirmed images I've seen.
I suggested tomato hornworm because that's what I believed my spotting was of http://www.projectnoah.org/spottings/6886571. However I'm now leaning towards tobacco hornworm for both http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manduca_sexta and http://www.coopext.colostate.edu/4DMG/Pests/tomato.htm. What is confusing me is I've had these moths http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manduca_quinquemaculata in my garden as well.

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