Tomato

pclark42 · July 2023

This year I only grew 3 tomato plants in my polytunnel because I wanted to give my grapevine all the room, those 3 tomatoes are doing fine, however, I purchased one of those cheap plastic half greenhouses, and in it I have grown 3 more tomatoes, a cucumber and a sweet chilli. The lower leaves of the tomatoes are being eaten by something, what would that be? they only seem to touch the lower leaves, I have cut many off, and I have not seen any trace of slugs.

tui34 · July 2023

Hi

They are being eaten by a species that come out at night to devour your tomato leaves. They look like little packmen

You can only see them by candlelight (not torch light) and they only come out after midnight.

diggersjo · July 2023

Look under the pot and in the house corners during the day. I would suspect snail or slug.

pclark42 · August 2023

tui34 said:

Hi

They are being eaten by a species that come out at night to devour your tomato leaves. They look like little packmen

You can only see them by candlelight (not torch light) and they only come out after midnight.

I was up at 3am and took 2 candles down the garden, nothing there to be seen except a hedgehog, I have cut all the lower leaves off the plants and put slug pellets around them.

tui34 · August 2023

Glad that you have a hedgehog - the gardener's friend - but although they like slugs and snails (that haven't consumed the pellets), the "packmen" have a sole predator - the sulphur crested pukeko - find one of those and your problems are over!

Fairygirl · August 2023

Sorry for being ignorant, but what are 'packmen'?

The most likely culprit is slugs - the small ones do the most damage, but a photo of any damage will always help @pclark42 . They might be attracted because of the cucumbers - slugs like the foliage on those sorts of plants. If it's only a few leaves, it won't affect the toms anyway