Anyone Else Dealing With Caterpillar Infestations?

I live towards the NE and have been dealing with a horrible infestation of Eastern Tent Caterpillars... everywhere. Especially in my fruit trees. Since it has started to get warm, I've removed multiple nests from each tree but they seem to come back with a vengeance. When returning home tonight, I walked up to several of the trees to check out how the fruit is coming along and noticed thousands of these caterpillars eating the trees. I pulled the nests out and stomped the little bastards but was hoping someone on here had some sort of remedy to take care of them for good. They don't turn into the beautiful butterflies, they turn into annoying moths. I was also wondering if they eat MJ or would lay their eggs in the buds? I read up on them but all that I learned was that they prefer to make their nests in and eat the foliage of Apple, Peach, Pear, Cherry, and Plum trees... all of which I grow. Any help would be freaking awesome.. Thanks in advance.

They're bad here, worse than I've seen in several years. I think manual or chemical control is about all there is. I've pulled a few down too, I don't spray chemicals. Supposedly some birds eat them, but the birds here ignore them. I don't have an answer but yeah, bad this year.

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From what I've read it may be too late for the BT to work. It says that those that are already migrating to pupate, cannot be treated effectively with Bt.
And yes.. I haven't seen it this bad since I was a kid in the 80s.. when a car would drive down the street you could hear them popping.
I thought that with the extremely low temps that we had during the winter that it would've killed off a lot of the pests.. Between the stink bugs and caterpillars, I'm not sure which is worse.

if the caterpillar eats it he is going to die.

Alright.. I'm pretty sure that I have some BT left in my garden shed. I'm going to go ahead and try it. The life cycles of different bugs is one thing that I never retained any knowledge to in any high-school or college science and biology courses. Thanks for the help!

If you are having fruit and leaf damage it's going to work. BT is organic . Pyrethians might work. Thing is those white moths they make will eventually hammer your weed. You have to start somewhere. Split it up with Spinosad too.

I'd rather stay the organic route with anything that will be eventually consumed. I've never heard of the spinosad.. I have Sevin dust and pyrethian powders but only ever use them as a last resort But I had a feeling insects would be bad this year and decided to be proactive with my guerilla plots and pre-treated the areas with a combo of both. The carbaryl is some nasty stuff and kills off the good insects as well as the bad.

Tent caterpillers are tough little suckers , In years that we have warm winters or their is a layer of snow on the ground inslutating it , will be a bad year . In that case PM

When I get the tents , I cut them down and burn them

Hit them with a little snort of Permethrin 38, Bye Bye bugs.......not organic, but highly effective....

I was a little stoned last night when I posted.. I guess almost all pesticides would kill the good as well as the bad. Organic or not. Like Lo Budget stated above, the birds definitely don't have any interest in them so I guess I'll try the BT as soon as weather permits. If that doesn't work I'm gona hit them with both Sevin Dust and the Permethrin in hopes that it keeps them at bay for a while at least.

They should be close to done, they are here. They don't eat as caterpillars.

BT will work, it saved my garden. Spinosad works well also. Some people like to rotate between the two.

Ladybugs?

BT or a product called Conserve. Both are bacteria that are harmless to mammal's but the microscopic bugs in the liquid enter into
the worms gut and produce toxins that kill it. Only difference is BT doesn't effect bees. Probably too late this year but for future reference.