Patty,

I've been waiting to hear the "cancer free" words come out of your mouth, and today they did. Hallelujah and hip hip hooray! Congratulations to you, your doctors and all the loving friends, family and medical personnel who got you through this battle. To quote the old southern (now deceased) humorist Ray Grizzard "There Ain't Nothing But Good Times Ahead". PTL indeed!

Nematodes can be found in all areas of your soil but also may be found only in some areas and not others. They tend to "congregate" and multiply in areas where plants they like are being grown. Using crop rotation is one way to limit them, particularly if you're using elbon rye grass in the rotation.

Since nematode populations build up over a period of years, it can take several years for a nematode infestation to reach such a level that you start noticing damage.

There are several types of nematodes, but the most common ones here seem to be root knot nematodes.

I'd try switching the planting sites for sure this year and see if the tomatoes perform better.

It also helps to add organic matter to your soil because the sandier the soil, in general, the more nematodes you have. I believe nematodes are more of a southern issue in the USA because the nematodes do not thrive in cold soil, so let's hope the very cold temperatures in much of OK this winter may have set back their population some.

Some friends of ours have switched from growing tomato plants in the ground to large containers because nematodes so heavily infest their sandy soil, so that's always an option for future years if you discover nematodes also infest your flower bed area after it becomes your new tomato bed area this year.

One way to help control the nematodes is to solarize your soil. The only problem with solarizing the soil is that it needs to be done during the growing season so that takes a plot of land out of production for solarization. Planting a special kind of cereal rye called "Elbon" in the fall also helps reduce nematode populations, so that's an option if you see nematodes in the area where you've been growing flowers and now wish to grow tomatoes.

Good luck with your nematode issue and your veggies. Remember that nematodes can travel from a nematode-infested spot to a nematode-free spot via tools, so always wash off your tools when you're going from the nematode-infested area to the nematode-free area.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Soil Solarization

I hope this goes thru. I will be doing this this year.

If link fails to go thru search
marigolds for nematode control

Here is a link that might be useful: Marigolds for Nematode Control

Hmm should have picked a link with less than 40 characters.

Here is a link that might be useful: Marigolds to control nematodes

Thank you, Dawn. My next step is going to be raised beds if this doesn't work. Actually, if I had the money I might do that now. I'm thinking that would take care of the bermuda problem too.

Punkinhead, I was planning to try marigolds around the tomatoes this year too. I've always heard they are a good idea but never tried it.

Patty

Raised beds don't work. The nematodes migrate up into them. ALL of my raised beds were infested last year.

Certain types of marigolds can work as a trap crop, but you have to plant them densely/cover crop. I have also heard certain marigolds will make it worse (food source for the nematodes). Elbon rye also makes a good trap crop (plant as a cover crop in the fall).

I had a very mixed gardening year last year. My wildflowers and herbs did great. Most of my tomatoes died early due to nematodes. The cherry varieties and a couple others lived almost until Thanksgiving. I never got any beans or peppers to speak of.

I solarized the first two beds when I realized they were infected. I planted elbon rye everywhere in the fall and tilled it in. I added crushed crab shells (chitin) which is supposed to suppress them. I added lots of organic matter. I added actino-iron.

This year I specifically sought out Nematode resastant tomato, bean, and pepper varieties to plant. Anything which is not nematode resistant (some tomatos, cucs) will go into containers or gro bags.

It is a terrible war I'm waging here, but I am determined to win it.

Jo

Patty, The only possible way I can imagine that raised beds would work and remain nematode-free would be if they had a concrete bottom and even then the spot where the sides of the bed meet the concrete base, whether the sides were wood or concrete blocks or whatever would need to be sealed with a waterproof caulking of some sort to keep groundwater from carrying nematodes up into the beds during heavy rainfall.

Those of you with nematodes should know that not only will they migrate upwards into raised beds but also into containers. You have to place your containers up off the ground a few inches by putting bricks, concrete blocks, landscape timbers or something else underneath them so that the nematodes cannot migrate up through the drainage holes. They need to be raised high enough that flash-flood type rainfall can't put enough water on the ground that the water flows up into your pots' drainage holes.

Punkinhead, For marigolds to be most effective, they should be planted in the whole bed as thick as grass, which is impossible if you actually want to grow something else in those beds. The way they did it in Texas when I was growing up was to thickly plant marigolds (and nothing else) in the whole bed and let them grow all year. Then,they rototilled them into the soil in the fall and used that bed the following spring. So, to use them effectively, you have to have multiple beds and half those beds are out of production every year just so you can grow the marigolds. To me, it seems more effective to grow in all the beds every year and just sow elbon rye every fall and till it into the soil in late winter a couple of weeks before you want to plant.

Jo, I think you've done everything you can to battle the nematodes and I hope you get a good crop this year.

The last resort would be to purchase predatory nematodes that kill the pest nematodes, but they are vastly expensive, and I am not certain how well they work.

As for marigolds y'all, I love them and plant them here and there around the veggie garden. However, they are spider mite magnets. Since spider mites are so common here, I use the marigolds as a trap crop. Once the marigold plants are heavily infested with spider mites, I pull them up and throw them away. For me that usually occurs in July. It is my hope that most of the mites are on the marigolds instead of being on my veggies. It seems to work pretty well. I still have spider mites show up on veggies every July or August, but not at such large numbers that they harm the plants significantly.

Dawn