Grow your own dinner 2014

Lifes_Grand_Plan

Hi folks,

Please help I have a great selection of tomato plants this year and they are all loaded with tomatoes but I have just noticed one plant has tomatoes that have a funny black-ish mark on them.



Image doesn't seem to be working, try this:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/c074b62zkiej1my/2014-08-07%2018.35.32.jpg

Can anyone tell me what this is and how I can deal with it. Please don't let it spoil my tomato crop, I have never grown anywhere as well as I have with this year's crop.

Fruittea

It looks a bit like blight to me or it could be mould. Have you been watering from above? The temperatures have been very hot and you might need to ventilate more.


I'd take off the fruit and as many of the leaves as you dare that has mould on it and get rid of them and spray the rest (the whole plant) with a Bordeaux mixture. It may just hold it back long enough for you to get some fruit. Spray every three weeks. Bordeaux is copper based and still considered organic - just make sure you wash the fruit well as the mixture is blue!

Fruittea

Jazee that house looks really lovely - I am so envious of you. I bet it cost a packet but well worth it.

Happygreen

LGP, I agree with Fruittea, it looks sadly like blight to me. Just follow FT's advice (but I've not tried the spray) . Should you need to harvest too many green ones if it gets worse, I'll find a nice recipe for Green Tomato Mincemeat for you. It's not the same as lovely and ripe red toms but better than throwing them out!

Lifes_Grand_Plan

Thanks guys Every year blight gets me. What annoys most is I purposefully haven't been watering from above this year and water directly at the soil.

Can / will the blight spread between plants? I have 5 in a row on that side of my garden and three separate ones on the opposite side about 6m away.

Lifes_Grand_Plan

Fruittea wrote: »

It looks a bit like blight to me or it could be mould. Have you been watering from above? The temperatures have been very hot and you might need to ventilate more.

I'd take off the fruit and as many of the leaves as you dare that has mould on it and get rid of them and spray the rest (the whole plant) with a Bordeaux mixture. It may just hold it back long enough for you to get some fruit. Spray every three weeks. Bordeaux is copper based and still considered organic - just make sure you wash the fruit well as the mixture is blue!

Thanks fruittea. When you say ventilate more, do you mean in a greenhouse? My plants are growing outside.

Thanks for the other advice though.

Would there be any benefit in forgetting about Bordeaux mix, ripping that plant out altogether and getting rid of it, in the hope of saving the other plants?

Happygreen

I have had less blight this year growing them in pots. It might be soil borne spores but I'm not sure if they spread through air as well..

Fruittea

Sorry to hear you have blight Life's grand plan. And agree it might be good to sacrifice the one plant to save the rest as the spores are airborne. I would still spray as a precaution - the Bordeaux should stop it spreading outside (I thought you meant they where in a green house - my mistake).


And yes please share that green tomato mince Happygreen- it sounds interesting.


For anyone really concerned about blight the times when it is at it's worst is rain after a hot spell. These periods can be predicted by the Potato Council and you can even sign up to the PC's text warning and spray before an event. Bit nerdy but if you are doing it an behalf of on allotment group - it might be worth it. It's postcode dependent otherwise I would offer to alert you all. Here's the link. http://www.potato.org.uk/fight-against-blight
Good luck and I hope you save your toms.

zafiro1984

OK, I know I've craved rain down here in the south over the last couple of weeks, but the gods are answering me in abundance at the moment - a bit too much, as the drive is starting to disappear down the hill.

The upside is - no need to water the veg today, so I think I'll stay indoors as the house could do with a 'birthday'

Dizzy_Ditzy

I was planting sprouts at the allotment yesterday and we had visitors, so I never ended up watering them in

Probably just as well, they'd be making their way down the M5 if I had :rotfl:

Picked my first cabbage yesterday :j shame it was for said visitors! I'll just have to go up and get another one :cool:

You have no idea how happy that sentence make me :j