what kind of animal eats large hole in tomatoes and what to do with remaining tomatoes

Chipmunks. I have actually seen one under a tomato plant eating a tomato. So what I do is plant grape tomatoes early. As the larger tomatoes are maturing, I sprinkle some of the grape tomatoes around the base of the larger tomato plants. The chipmunks go after the ripe grape tomatoes on the ground and leave the larger tomatoes farther up the plant alone. Also, I harvest the tomatoes just as they are starting to turn red (blushing).

tsungajunkie, that is a great idea!

Mice will eat holes in tomatoes too, if they are close to the ground. Some of mine have that damage each year, as they begin to ripen. When that starts (as in now) I place traps near the damaged tomato, baited with something more attractive (such as pieces of dried apricot). Mouse runs are usually under heavy foliage, so I mark the trap locations with survey flags. Voles become especially active late in the season, and will damage beans as well. If you put mouse traps in the garden for the first time, check the traps daily - you might be amazed at how many you catch.

For us and our neighbours this year it's been rats. And the way we both dealt with them was with snap-traps, and they worked a charm. Simply baited those with their favourite food -in this case cherry tomatoes- and we quickly eliminated a whole family of rats over the course of 3 nights, like this:

Soooo close, yet so far away....

Pieter

Must be my old age. Took me a while to clue in to the title. I was like ”Wow! I would love to grow a whole bunch of those over the place. That would take care of all those vermints!”