tomatos hit by blight

I'm pretty bummed out, most of my 50 tomato plants were hit with blight. All the hard work....starting them all from seed under a light. I have tried everything but very hot humid weather hit us hard with a lot of rain. I guess I need to change to hybrids. I may check my ego and buy a few tomato plants so I have some.

Ouch. So sorry!

That's terrible! There's been the first confirmed case of the season in the UK as well, quite far away from where I am but I'm worried too. Growing tomatoes from seed is so much work!!!

TheJH, I do truly feel your pain. Were you able to diagnose exactly what it was? Early blight? There are so many tomato diseases. I keep my fingers crossed every time I go out and look at mine . . .

Sorry to hear that. You are not alone. I have diagnosed Early Blight on about half of my plants. They are pruned to one stem and I removed the lower leaves on the larger plants, but I got it anyway. I have been spraying with Neem Oil.

Do I rip the bad plants out and buy some resistant hybrids? Or just leave them alone.

On another forum, a respected "plant guru" suggested stripping off the affected leaves, or at least most of them and treating with fungicide. Two of my plants have it -- the only hybrids I planted -- and I stripped off all yellowing leaves yesterday. Time will tell if it will continue to spread. But those almost nekked plants full of little grape tomatoes sure do look funny. Oh, and I understand it's really transferred by potatoes, so if you are also growing potatoes, make sure and check them for blight as well.

Whoa! We are talking about two entirely different diseases. Early blight is not the potato famine disease. That's late blight -- the one that blitzed so many tomato plants last year in the northeastern states. The two don't look anything alike. Here's a really good photo of late blight: http://www3.telus.net/kirbyrd/farm/late-blight.jpeg

To TheJH, and anyone else already hit, you have my condolences.

Yesterday I watched a video from Johnny's Seeds, http://www.johnnyseeds.com/t-video.aspx.

The one I watched was on late blight, and it gave a preventative approach, which is far more likely to be successful than a curative approach.

This was the best info I found - from a quick search, not intensive - for prevention of early blight.
http://www.motherearthnews.com/Grow-It/Organic-Gardening/Preventive-Pruning-for-Tomato-Early-Blight-Control.aspx

I've got early blight on my potatoes, and it tried to spread to my tomatoes. I removed the infected tomato leaves and have been treating with fungicide. We'll see how it goes!

Just to add a note. From what I've read you will have to use the fungicide DAILY for 7 - 14 days depending on the fungicide you've chosen. I too have early blight.

I wanted to pass on a description that might help you figure out if you have early blight or septoria blight, from: Iowa State, http://www.plantpath.iastate.edu/pdc/node/120

"Wet conditions favor the development of fungal blights of tomato. Two
common foliage diseases of tomato are early blight, caused by
Alternaria solani, and Septoria blight, caused by Septoria lycopersici.
Both blights attack foliage, particularly older (lower) leaves. Early
blight causes brown spots of varying size (up to more than 1/2" in
diameter) that typically contain concentric rings of darker brown.
Septoria blight causes numerous small ( about 1/8" to 1/4" in diameter)
brown spots that develop light tan to white center as they age. The
overall effect of both blights is similar. Leaves turn yellow, brown,
then wither and die. "

Remember to water in the morning so that the water has time to evaporate and not keep the plant and leaves moist through the night
and never work with wet tomato plants - you can easily transfer the fungus to other plants

dmpower wrote:Just to add a note. From what I've read you will have to use the fungicide DAILY for 7 - 14 days depending on the fungicide you've chosen. I too have early blight.

WRONG, WRONG, WRONG

So sorry, I misread and didn't have the document in front of me when I posted.

"Typical application Interval" 5 - 14 days depending on fungicide used.
Here's a great page that talks about dealing with, and preventing early blight:
http://pmo.umext.maine.edu/factsht/earlytom.htm

Sorry - I stand corrected. But here in the South, since we've already harvested most of the potatoes, I think we can be affected by both early and late blight, almost at the same time. I forget that folks in the north actually have seasons, rather than "cold or hot". Sorry if I contributed to the confusion.

belfrybat wrote:Sorry - I stand corrected. But here in the South, since we've already harvested most of the potatoes, I think we can be affected by both early and late blight, almost at the same time. I forget that folks in the north actually have seasons, rather than "cold or hot". Sorry if I contributed to the confusion.

Damn, you make me jealous, if only I could handle the heat!!

Late blight on tomatoes confirmed in CT, MA, ME, NY, PA, IN, MD, MI, ND, KY, LA, WI and Manitoba. Here is an website that speaks to what it is, what it looks like, how your crops get it and how to treat it.

http://www.umassvegetable.org/LateBlightAlertforTomatoandPotato.html

Late Blight vs. Early Blight

Thanks to our recent tendency to have late afternoon/evening thunderstorms -- which of course keeps the plants wet overnight -- I've been pulling off yellowing, spotted lower leaves like crazy, especially on the Romas, which are resistant to NOTHING! First thing in the morning I check all of them and pull or cut off every leaf that I even think might be diseased. I'm not complaining, though, because this is the first year I have ever had a decent tomato harvest.

I'm thinking that next year I will have to spray the Romas. I hate to do that -- yuck -- spent too many years trying to grow hybrid tea roses in Charleston, where they have to be sprayed continually with nasty stuff. I'll use something organic on the Romas, but I still hate the thought of it.

I really like that U of MA article, camprn.

(hoping the blight doesn't find me)