Here is a link to many of the previous discussions on disease prevention you may want to read through for tips. But the common answer is the only way most of the common diseases can be prevented is with a regular fungicide spraying program from day one of planting out. Otherwise all you can do is hope to slow it down long enough to harvest the fruit.

Preventing tomato diseases discussions

Dave

[fungicide] ...FROM DAY ONE...

please remember this !

I just learned that mycorrhizae fungi I apply at the seed stage all the way to soaking the transplant is keeping EB at check. Wonderful news! I was wondering how with these uber rains I am barely seeing any...

I have never used fungicide in 25 years of gardening, mostly tomatoes. At least 15 and as many as 40 tomato plants planted each year. Have never had what I would call blight, just normal yellowing of lower leaves. Maybe we just have good soil. Who knows? I do rotate my garden space every few years. And I don't touch plants with bare hands, etc, just common good gardening hygiene.

You are right Sey, maybe just lucky. Just happy to save on the expense and time that spraying would involve. Although, outside of this web site, I have never known anyone to use fungicide as a preventative, and I meet a lot of gardeners at the Farmers Market on Saturdays.

Maybe a regional thing?

I've never known anyone to use fungicide either.

It is always a good idea to prune off the lowest branches on tomatoes because will always get virus and that cannot be prevented by anything. It is an age thing. When the tomato plant is old enough, it gets virus.

- Tomatoes…what is the difference between early blight and late blight?

- Tomato Blight: Organic Treatment for Early and Late Blight
- Early Blight In Tomatoes- What Is It, And What Can Be Done About It?

- How to Prevent Late Blight on Tomatoes

tete_a_tete wrote: > It is always a good idea to prune off the lowest branches on tomatoes
because will always get virus and that cannot be prevented by anything.
It is an age thing. When the tomato plant is old enough, it gets virus.
I always prune the lowest branches. And here and there for better air circulation. I remove very few suckers.
I also mulch and fungicide - I use copper, weekly, from DAY ONE.
My tomatoes last year, grew almost 20 ft. high.

They were pretty "OLD" but they did NOT get any blight !

In my first year of gardening, I did NOT fungicide nor mulch.

I lost EVERYTHING. Don't know what disease was and it's not important.

The truth is that I don't know..

Last year... THIS:

And THIS:

I'm not interested in experimenting to see how my garden would look like if I do NOT fungicide !

dbrown2351 and tete_a_tete, what are your locations ?

Do you have neibor tomato growers ? How far from you ?

dbrown2351 wrote: > ... I have never known anyone to use fungicide as a preventative...

But, as... what ?

Btw dbrown2351 and tete_a_tete, can we see pictures of your tomatoes ?

Could be old pictures from previous years.

<It is always a good idea to prune off the lowest branches on tomatoes because will always get virus and that cannot be prevented by anything. It is an age thing. When the tomato plant is old enough, it gets virus.>

I think you must mean "it might get a fungus or bacterial infection" not a virus. If all tomato plants always got a virus there wouldn't be many tomatoes since the viral diseases normally destroy the plant before it can produce fruit. And there would be lots of viral contaminated soil on this earth. Millions of tomatoes are grown annually without ever getting any virus. Personally I have never had a virus infection in over 50 years of growing tomatoes, even in my so-called "old" plants.

<Although, outside of this web site, I have never known anyone to use fungicide as a preventative, and I meet a lot of gardeners at the Farmers Market on Saturdays.>

Seriously? Only this website? All you have to do is look at any of the scientific research or university extension publications on the use of fungicides. Every single one of them will discuss the preventative role of fungicides. Maybe the folks you meet at the Farmer's Markets just don't recognize a fungus disease when they see it. Either that or they do but don't care.

It is amazing what one can learn when they do a little reading and research.

Dave

Well, see I grow tomatoes as a fun hobby and because I like them to eat and can and occasionally sell for profit.

Reading scientific research regarding fungicides is not on my current reading list but perhaps in the future if I have a fungus problem.

If fungicides work for you I'm all for it.

dbrown2351, I still think that it would be nice to answer my questions.

Maybe we'll learn a thing or two.

Hi dbrown2351,

All I can say is I hope your luck continues, or your weather and climate continue to not promote sporolation. I am so frustrated here I bought seeds for $1.50 a seed with all kinds of resistances that probably will make tomatoes that taste like raw winter squash. And what pisses me off is when the stingy place that sold them to me packed them, they didn't even add a single extra for a paltry seed count.

lindalana that's an interesting observation. Shall we look for a vicious microbial fungivore?!!

PC

I am spraying regularly this year just as insurance policy since I have not seen blights of any kind around here. But come September, there will Grey Mold. . That is as bad as blight. It even affects the fruits.

PC, how do you cope with mold ? peroxide ?

Sey

Dbrown, you are so lucky! Yes, good soil is a must, but also good gardening practices. Unfortunately most of us is in different situation and yes, it is very time consuming to deal with fungal bacterial problems.

PC, here is the link to studies. There is more on other forum where Ray posted Mycorrhizae

dbrown2351, I STILL want to see some pictures of your garden.

Nice link lindalana, tx. I'll read it in a rainy November day. 130 pages... wow !

Btw, how many of you rotate the crop ?

Picture for dbrown2351:

> Tomatoes are subject to a number of fungus diseases which are lethal and can ruin your whole crop. [ Yes, you should rotate your tomatoes. ]

Here' s a Better Boy about 2 weeks away from ripening. Ive posted other pictures recently in other threads to which you. Dave have commented on. Nothing but green.

dbrown2351, this is another picture you posted in this forum.

Can we see a recent picture of your tomatoes, from the SAME angle ?

Also, please reread my posts above to see my questions.

Thanks lindalana, for the link. Seems to be somebody's dissertation in Germany who had a Cuban product, nice grant and a good Danish plant analysis lab. I had difficulty getting through it since the writing style was all over the map. The research looked reasonable for a graduate student, but it's definitely something to sleep on. It would be nice to see this in its peer-reviewed final published form and to see if other researchers in the field consider the results remarkable enough for citing.

I think it was a very cool project, and may well illustrate some benefits that had been known for years before (old Tami U website of Davies Googles up where they had been studying this for years before but caution it is not a panacea but say it can help. I really don't know what to make of the test setup. I have some questions on the very small pots ("3 kg"), that the plants were measured in the early vegetative stage when in my particular case, plants are usually disease free, and not when fruiting when mine show symptoms, and the generalization of the results based on some "soil" chosen was 50% sterile sand and some undisclosed 50% other soil irradiated to sterility with a powerful electron beam. Not sure how this translates, if at all. I'm not disputing the findings, I like them. I am just wondering how applicable it is to a real life situation. Thanks very much for taking the time to post the link :-)

"PC, how do you cope with mold ? peroxide ?"

Hi Sey,

I
try to keep my main plants dry and airy in a tall hoop with open ends.
Daconil sprayed on them lasts a long time this way in addition to the
benefit of keeping water off the leaves in the first place.
I'm
starting new seeds today. I only use peroxide to disinfect between
crops but that helps, so soon I'll be doing that. The ground in the
hoop is covered in landscape fabric and everything gets drenched in the
peroxide including plastic cover pvc supports, irrigation tubing and
other support hardware in there. Peroxide might provide some initial
disinfectant activity if applied to the leaves, but in too high
concentrations it could risk damage to the good parts of the leaf and
give the fungus more openings, because the despicable mold penetrates
the protective barrier of the leaf. So it all still comes down to
prevention :-(

Daniel wrote:
"Tomatoes are subject to a number of fungus diseases which are lethal and can ruin your whole crop. [ Yes, you should rotate your tomatoes. ]"

I can't resist Daniel. While we are still passing around the pear wine from rgreen, I decided to rotate your tomatoes. I hope you don't mind ;-)

(EDIT: removed picture, and note tomatoes were not Daniel's)
PC

PC, I don't mind, but why would you rotate "my" picture ?

"My" picture is EXACTLY like in the one in the Webpage where I took it from...

Daniel, You mean that's not what you meant by "you should always rotate your tomatoes?" ;-)
My bad. Carry on. Picture unrotated and removed.
PC

Lol, PC... On the Plant Hardiness Zone Map I was going to either offer more wine, or let them use the already empty bottles to settle things down. ;-)

PC, rotate the "tomatoes" not the "picture"... lol.

rgreen, it's happened again! We better collect the empty bottles!
PC

Lol... one of my favs from the 'old' days. "Warriors... come out and play...ay..."

Too funny!