I went out to do some harvesting and found five tomatoes that had started to rot. I am guessing this is late blight? The leaves on the plants look good still and it appears it was just affecting a few tomatoes that all were at the tip of the clutch. Here's hoping it doesn't start to spread! I nipped out all the affected plant parts and will disposes of them in the garbage. Maybe I will drown my sorrows by canning some garden tomato sauce & fermenting some tomato seeds tonight....*Update - I went out to see if I could find any more damage and there is brown spots on the leaves and stems. I removed some more material and I guess I will just have to wait it out. I hope that at least the largest tomatoes that currently are on the plants will ripen. I am definitely not going to spray, the organic copper based sprays can kill birds & worms as well as cause liver damage to humans so I will not touch that stuff.
I guess this is to be expected with the season we have had. July saw only three days above 30c(86F) and August was not much better. August was also very rainy with use seeing a 1/4 more rain then the norm. This season has really tested ones veggie gardening patiences!
I'm in Cambridge and just had this happen to some of my crop two weeks ago, it spread fast and I had to rip them all out. My cherry tomatoes are on the other side of my yard and in a different garden and have been fine so far, but I noticed some spotting on the leaves yesterday...
ReplyDeleteLooks like blight. If you catch it early you might get away with destroying just the affected foliage, which must be burnt or thrown in with household rubbish. Do not put affected material in your compost bin.
ReplyDeleteGood luck.
Oh no. I'm so sorry to hear that. I suppose I was lucky in one way with blight in my tomatoes. I didn't get many tomatoes affected. Mostly it was just the foliage.
ReplyDeleteYup, that's late blight. Your best bet, unfortunately, is to salvage what tomatoes you can and rip the plants out. I know its painful.
ReplyDeleteDevastating news Dan ! I'm so sorry.
ReplyDeleteI would not use the copper stuff on my toms either (or anything else for that matter). I agreed to use it on the spuds, but very sparingly (sprayed only 3 times), since only the foliage was being sprayed, not the fruit/veg.
My stomach dropped when I saw your first picture.
ReplyDeleteUnfortunately, it does look like Late Blight. I am so sorry.
Hopefully you can save some of the fruit by pulling from the plant as soon as they blush and ripen them on a windowsill. Gosh that sucks.
Oh no! I'm so sorry. Did you get any good ones during the season to make up for it?
ReplyDeleteThanks for the feedback everyone, lets hope it stops affecting the fruits like in Daphne's case.
ReplyDeleteRibbit - I have had a few tomatoes this season but three varieties have yet to ripen. With this summers cool weather it has really slowed down ripening.
Awww, I'm so sorry to hear that, Dan. I wish you were close enough to share my bounty.
ReplyDeleteHaving just had to pull up all my sauce tomatoes... I can totally emphathize and sadly confirm... that it is indeed blight. I noticed today that the my remaining Siletz and Stupice plants look to be going down from it too now. The only variety I have that is hanging in there is "Legend" - which is blight tolerant.
ReplyDeleteI did manage to pull alot of fruit off of the plants that were not exhibiting disease and were breaking color. They have been ripening up pretty well off the vine - so not a complete loss.
What a bummer....an application of Mancozeb might control it, however.
ReplyDeleteI only use copper fungicide for controlling powdery midew....
yep! that's blight alright. it will spread no matter what you do, pick all the green ones and use them. Destroy all the foliage. Seems to be commonplace nowadays, I'm sorry for you.
ReplyDeleteWhat a sad sight. All I can say is, thank goodness for green tomato chutney!
ReplyDeleteWhat a bummer! They were looking so good too. Give it time.
ReplyDeleteDan, I'm so sorry! It does sound a lot like late blight, doesn't it? I'm getting this rot on most of my near-ripe tomatoes, though my cherokee purples are farther along and I can harvest them. Maybe the "late" refers to the tendency for the blight to appear this late in the tomatoes' development?
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