Attack of the Green Tomato Hornworm

I often leave for work before the sun rises.  This means that I often water the garden before the sun comes up, so I occasionally miss a pest problem in the early stages.  This week was no exception.  I went outside to pick the first of the beefsteak tomatoes and a handful of cherry tomatoes and found that both plants had been decimated by a hungry critter.  As I reached down to look at the half of a tomato dangling from the vine I saw a huge caterpillar.  I'm talking about a 4-inch long green behemoth as thick as my thumb clinging to the stem below the fruit.  Green Tomato Hornworm.  After further inspection I found at least one more, and a few other tomatoes that were likely harboring smaller versions of the buggers.  I removed the worms and the infected fruit by hand and fed the worms to some hungry birds.

The tomato in the back of the picture has been hollowed out, and contains a fat green worm, a bird swooped down and nabbed it while I was working in another part of the yard so they must be tasty.  I did some research and supposedly hot pepper and dish soap in water will keep these guys at bay, so I'm mixing up a batch and will return to my plant with spray bottle in hand this evening.