The creature in question, having been plucked from a tomato plant and with a telltale horn up on its rump, would seem readily identifiable as a tomato hornworn. However, DonDiego's superior zoological identification skills recognize it is, in fact, a tobacco hornworm.
The effect on tomato/pepper plants is, in either case the same. The buggers simply eat the plant - leaves, stems, fruit, . . . everything.
The "worms" are actually the larvae of the Carolina Sphinx Moth,
i.e. caterpillars. To address Roulette Man's query, the moth lays its eggs upon the leaves of the tomato plant.
The initial corrective action is to pick them off, . . . somewhat difficult because they are the color of a tomato plant; usually the alert tomato rancher will observe plant damage and then find the buggers adjacent to it.
Sevin, . . .
aka Carbaryl, . . . is, indeed, the chemical weapon of mass destruction. DonDiego actually observed a tiny, newly-hatched larva about a month ago and sprayed the plants with Carbaryl; hopefully the pictured horned-devil is one of few if any other survivors of the chemical warfare.
The ranch is already quite productive:
But the successful tomato rancher must be ever alert.
