Hello all,

I am writing from Lockhart, Texas. I have started 4 kinds of tomatoes from seed this year (12 each - Yellow Pear, Roma, Cherokee Purple and Brandywine,) and as a novice gardener have had pretty good luck so far. We had about two weeks of damp, cool weather followed by two weeks of REALLY damp, really HOT (90+) weather.

I have been trying to let the soil dry out a bit between waterings, but I am afraid I either let it dry too much last week, or I have some sort of problem. I came home Friday night, and found about 9 plants on thier side and wilted (they were staked, but the ties had loosened sufficiently for them to fall over.) I have since put ALL of them in cages, and some of the plants bounced back...but I have lost 5, and two others still look very droopy and wilted...but have no foliage discoloration.

Two of the plants I pulled up seemed to have good root systems, but the base of the stem (at ground level) was brownish in color, and very brittle. There wasn't any kind of seepage, and I haven't seen any suspicious-looking bugs on them. I have been on dozens of sites with photos, and have not seen anything that looks like what I am seeing in my garden.

ONE OTHER THING TO NOTE...I had fertilized a couple of weeks ago, placing the 2T of fertilizer nest to each plant and watering it in...I noticed the plants that I pulled up still had some undissolved granules near the discolored stem.

So my question is:

1) Can undissolved fertilizer "burn" the stems and make them weak?

2) Is this more likely to be some sort of contagious disease?

3) Should I wait to see if the other plants will bounce back or pull them up?

4) Is there anything I can do to protect my other plants from getting sick with the same thing?

Thanks so much to all you tomato gurus!