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Tomato Plant Diseases

There are sooo many diseases that can attack your tomato plants that it’s mind boggling. Here are a few of the most common tomato plant problems:

– Early Blight – caused by a soil born fungus and the culprit is excessive water and affects the foliage and the fruit.

– Blossom Rot – is caused by a low concentration of calcium in the fruit

– Late Blight – also caused by a fungus which manifests in moist soils and affects the foliage and the fruit.

There are ways to help combat these diseases and the fall is absolutely the BEST time to do it. If you are a serious gardener and want to produce your best crop ever, then you need to start conditioning your soil now. The following are some great organic ways to get that soil ready:

1. Pull out all the dead plants and if diseased burn or bag up and throw away.

2. Till up the soil to get it ready for a thick layer of your home made compost.

3. Mix compost and a fertilizer low in nitrogen but high in superphosphate, such as 4-12-4 or 5-20-5, (for calcium) in a big 5 gallon bucket, add water to make a tea like mixture and spread mixture generously over the entire garden.

4. Cover entire garden area with a thick layer of your home made mulch. (Made of grass clippings, wood chips, coffee grounds, dead leaves etc.)

Growing healthy tomatoes: disease and fungal prevention.

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Regardless of your level of experience in growing tomatoes, diseases and other problems associated with gardening are bound to challenge you at some point in your career. Although tomatoes are one of the easiest crops for beginning gardeners to grow successfully, there are still numerous maladies out there that may attack your tomato garden. Not to worry though, most problems you may encounter are preventable with good garden hygiene and maintenance. If your plants do contract a disease or fungus, the sooner you detect the problem, the better the plants’ chances for survival.

Some of the most effective ways of dealing with tomato garden diseases starts with prevention. Before you even begin planting, a little research is in order. Talk to some experienced gardeners in your local area and find out about the more prevalent diseases that occur in the region. Once you’ve identified the most common problems, you can find a tomato variety that has been specifically bred to be resistant to that malady. For example, if fusarium wilt and nematodes are a problem in your area, consider a tomato that has the designation “VFN” after the variety name. This code designates a natural resistance to that particular fungus. If there is a “T” tagged on to the name, the tomato plant is also less prone to be affected by tobacco mosaic virus.

Ask any gardener about their favorite tasting tomato, and they’re sure to tell you about some type of heirloom variety. Unfortunately, heirlooms have not been bred for disease resistance, just flavor, so they tend to be more susceptible to tomato diseases and pests. If you have your heart set on growing heirlooms, you must practice preventative medicine to keep your plants healthy. Consider staking or caging your tomato plants so that they are kept off the ground and air can more freely circulate between them. Excessive moisture on the leaves will promote fungal infections. Make sure your soil is healthy and packed with nutritious organic “humus,” which will keep your plants nourished. A good covering of mulch over the soil will keep the underlying soil moist without having to water excessively.

Three Tomato Plant Diseases – How to Recognize and Treat Them

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The very first time I grew tomato plants, I believe, it was a fairly successful season. What I mean is, I harvested a decent amount of fruits and it tasted okay. At the time I did not know anything about tomato plants having diseases, I never thought anything about the yellow leaves, and leaves with spots or even a fruit now and then having a dark spot on it.

It was not until I did a little research about tomatoes and planting them to have more success in future growing seasons, that I found out my first tomato plant had diseases. I also found that there are numerous problems you can encounter, but fear not because my first season was okay even though I did not know anything.

Leaf Spot

Common Tomatoe Diseases And Problems

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Leaf Spot

How to Identify Tomato Plant Diseases

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With good planting methods your tomato plants should grow up to be strong and healthy with vibrant green leaves and healthy fruit. Unfortunately things may not always go smoothly and your plants may catch one of many tomato diseases. Fortunately, with good tomato disease identification most can be controlled or treated if you spot them early enough.

Identifying Whether Your Plant has a Disease:

Most tomato plant diseases start appearing on the leaf first so you should be inspecting your plant leaves very regularly both topside and underside. You want to be looking for brown spots and yellowing of the leaves. Certain tomato diseases also affect the stem and fruit so you want to check these areas also. We will now look at the symptoms and related tomato disease most likely to affect your plants.

Symptom #1: Small Brown spots with dark outlines on mature leaves:

This is most likely a case of Septoria Leaf Spot. Typically the spots have a diameter between 1-3mm, sometimes circled by a yellow patch. If the number of spots increases the leaf will die and drop off. Fortunately this disease is rarely fatal to the plant and only affects the leaves. To treat Septoria Leaf Spot you should remove infected leaves, keep the plant dry if possible and prevent it touching neighbouring plants. Fungicides can also be applied successfully. Crop-rotation is a longer term solution recommended by experts – consider planting your tomatoes in a different location next season.

Symptom #2: Brown spots composed of circular rings that resemble a shooting target:

These concentric rings are a tell-tale sign of Early Blight. Unfortunately this disease can also affect the stem and fruit of your plant. You can use similar fungicides as used for septoria leaf spot. Remove any ripe or damaged tomatoes immediately to prevent spreading of the disease. Crop-rotation is a recommended solution going forwards.

Symptom #3: Small dark circular spots appear on the fruit only:

This is likely to be a case of Anthracnose – the most common fruit-attacking disease. It typically appears on ripe/over-ripe tomatoes. The fungus can remain in the soil and survive winters. Fungicides can be used to treat the plant and all ripe fruit should be removed as soon as possible.

Preventing Tomato Diseases:

Taking certain measures will go a long way to preventing your tomato plants catching diseases. Use disease resistant varieties of seeds and plants to reduce chances of disease. Also diseases flourish more when the leaves are wet – try to keep your leaves dry when watering and support your plant well so that the leaves are open to air and sunlight.

7 Deadly Tomato Plant Diseases and How to Spot Them

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Your tomato plants can be quite vulnerable to a whole range of unpleasant little diseases. Unfortunately, many tomato plant diseases are fungus-based and pretty lethal. But if you identify them early you might be able to take some action and save your plant. Or at least stop the disease spreading to your other plants.

Here are ten of the most common diseases and some hints on how to spot them:

1. Bacterial Spot & Bacterial Speck

This highly contagious disease which most commonly strikes during wet or moist weather, when the plant is not properly ventilated and kept dry. It can be quite hard to control, because it’s so contagious be sure not to move the contaminated spot about.

You’ll recognize it from dark, raised spots appearing on the fruit or leaves.

How to Deal With Tomato Plant Diseases

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Tomato plants are very vulnerable to disease, most of which are fungi-based and almost impossible to get rid of once a plant has become infected. The best way to save your plants from tomato plant diseases is with adequate care and preventative measures. But here is how you can identify a disease and deal with it in the best possible way:

Identifying a Tomato Disease

Most diseases will cause spots or dark patches to appear on your plant leaves or on the fruit itself. Often these patches will discolour – becoming dark brown or black in wet weather. The diseases most likely to strike in dry, hot weather tend to be lighter in colour.

As the diseases tend to interrupt the proper flow of nutrients, water and oxygen through the plant’s system. Growth of the outer-reaching areas of the plant will often be inhibited and one of the first symptoms of any tomato plant disease is the upper leaves beginning to wilt and turn yellow.

Tomato Plant Diseases – How to Win the Battle

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Wikipedia lists 59 various strains of disease for tomatoes. Not an incredibly large number considering the worldwide prevalence of the fruit but still concerning to the home gardener who doesn’t want any disease affecting his or her crop.

Fortunately there are a number of things that you can do to drastically reduce the chances of your plants suffering from disease and I will cover them in this article.

Research: The first thing that anyone should do when they start out growing tomatoes (or anything for that matter) is to consult local authorities about the plant. By authorities I mean people who have experience in growing the plant locally.

So go talk to people at your local market, nurseries and gardening fairs and see what they know. Find out what diseases, if any, are prevalent in the area and if there are some then plant a variety that is resistant to that disease.