Garden-Share

Tomato Blight

Well seems our tomatoes have fallen victim to what is called late tomato blight. From what I've read on the internet it is widespread throughout the country. Had a bumper crop of tomatoes that I just had to throw away. Very upsetting, first time this has ever happened to me in the many, many years of gardening. The tomatoes have a gray, greasy spot on them and they just rot quickly. I cut back all the dying leaves on a few of the plants so see if the plants improve with new shoots. Probably not enough time before our first frost for any tomatoes to develop, but with the crazy weather we've had this year you never know it could be warm until November. Oh well, as we say in Chicago, "there's always next year." Hope no one else is having this problem.

Tags: tomatoes, vegetables

0 members like this

< Previous Post

Comment

You need to be a member of Garden-Share to add comments!

Join Garden-Share

Comment by Maris Listello z5-IL on December 3, 2009 at 12:12pm: Thanks Willie. I think the problem this year was the cooler weather as we have very good drainage.

Comment by Willie Quesada on November 30, 2009 at 6:24am: I lived in Virginia 2 years ago for a period of 16 years and before that I lived in your town the windy city. In blue island. beautiful , anyhow the reason that Am writing is because in the time that i had being a gardener
only twice I had the problems with the tomatoes. once there and once in virginia. And the reason that i heard from a real old man that had being planting tomatoes for over 60 years was that if it rains too much and there is no a good draining and he was right . i solve the problem by planting my tomatoes the way i used to do. On a kind of raised bed and it works i have so many tomatoes and healthy too .Willie Q

Comment by Maris Listello z5-IL on September 12, 2009 at 2:43pm: All my tomatoes were started from seed, same as every other year. Probably the strange weather we had this year had more to do with the problem than anything else. I'll be pulling out the tomato plants tomorrow and bagging them and cleaning up all the tomatoes that fell off. I usually rotate where I plants things every year anyway and I'm going to solarize the soil so by next year, everything should be better if the weather cooperates!

Comment by Daisy Gardener on September 12, 2009 at 1:59pm: I've planted heirloom tomatoes and grape tomatoes, all started from seed. I've had poor production most of the summer. Some of my plants are done producing and they will go in the garbage bag! Be sure and get virus resistant plants next year ( I heard the heriloom tomatoes may not be resistantI will clean up everything in my garden. The cooler than normal weather has caused a lot of the problems, I used only organic fertilizer this year too, which is slower to work. Some of my indeterminent varieties are showing more growth in these last days of summer. I've usually had tomatoes til frost in central Indiana!

Contributing Gardener Comment by Diane Meyers zone 6/7 Or. on September 9, 2009 at 8:37pm: Sorry about your blight, I'm sure you already know to put infected plants and leaves in plastic leaf bags and throw away. Don't plant in the same place next year, I had it a few years ago and just left the area with only a clover cover crop the next year. Luckily I have the room to move the tomatoes far away. This year I had a bumper crop.