Whoa. Sounds bad. I know that urea is powerful stuff, used it once on a hayfield. Urea plus water equals a nitrogen mainline blast to green stuff fast. Likely just too much.... My knee jerk reaction is they are toast, but I'm NOT a great gardener either. This might help:

http://homeguides.sfgate.com/reverse-nitrogen-burn-tomato-plants-28444.html

Can you post a photo of the plants so we can see how badly they are burnt? Much depends on how much you applied. For example, if you applied a half-cup per plant and you have fast-draining soil, you might be able to water heavily and flush the urea out of the soil. On the other hand, if you applied a watering can full per plant, flushing seems less likely to help.

I do like the idea of using sawdush or wood mulch (small, tiny pieces like pine bark fines would be better than big chunks, I think) on the soil to try to draw out the excess nitrogen. Sawdust would be best, and I'd go so far as to try gently to work it into the soil around the plants to make it work faster, but only if I could do so without damaging the tomato plant roots.

It is important to not overreact as even badly-burned plants can recover. I've seen tomato plants drop all their leaves and put out brand new leaves and recover, although it was not an incident involving urea burn. Be patient and give the plants time to get better.

I'm sorry this happened to you. I hope you can save your plants. If you can't, the recommended planting dates for fall tomatoes are just around the corner, beginning around July first.

If the burn has not extended to the uppermost branches of the plants, I think you might be able to take cuttings of still-healthy branches and root the cuttings for replacement plants in case your current plants do not survive.

Please keep us posted on what you're trying and whether or not it is working.

And, as plants go, corn and onions are heavy nitrogen users, as are brassicas. Tomato plants, not so much. Pepper plants will tolerate heavy nitrogen, though probably not as much as you just gave your tomato plants. Chalk it up to 'lessons learned' if you cannot save the plants. Painful lessons like this are the type I remember best for the rest of my life.

One more thing, now that you stopped lurking and started talking, I hope you'll keep it up. If you've lurked here a while, you know we're a friendly bunch and always happy to have someone new join our happy little gardening family. If nothing else, misery loves company, and you'll find many sympathetic ears here when things go wrong. We've all been there before, and having someone who understands that these sorts of things happen somehow makes it better.

Dawn

Okie Dawn here is the damage I have done!! I do have wood chip mulch with paper as my garden mulch. I did add some bone meal to the ground to help lower the nitrogen level. I also removed the fruit that was on the plant. Thank you Dawn and Sheik Paladin for your time and answers!

Tommy Paone,

As long as the plants are green there is hope of a recovery. Keep watering them as water will leach out the nitrogen and it might help to trim off the dead parts. Tomatoes are very resilient plants and sometimes if they are nursed and taken care of they will come back, maybe late in the season but late is better than never. I know about fertilizer burn, I have done it too.

Thanks for taking the time to post the photo.

I agree with autheray and everything that he said is right on the money because he knows what he is talking about. Clearly, as he stated, he has had fertilizer burn and knows what it takes for the plants to recover. I don't think I've ever burnt my tomato plants with too much nitrogen but I'm filing this away in my head in case I ever do. You know, sometimes stuff just happens, intentional or not.

I think there is hope for your plants to recover. Even if they drop every leaf and look horrifically dead, I'd water them and leave them alone for another week or two and see if they begin to put out new growth. Sometimes, just when a sick plant looks its absolute worst, it is about to turn the corner and recover. However, they'll recover faster with the help of the surviving leaves so I wouldn't remove leaves that are only partially dead and still show some green.

Please keep us posted on how the plants do. We do care about you and your plants and are hoping for the best for all involved.

Some formulations of Urea are very strong and never should be used around non-grassy plants. Grass seems to love urea a lot more than most broad-leaved garden plants do, and you saw how happy it made the corn. (It also makes onions pretty happy.)

Tomato plants can be very resilient. Let's hope that yours are.

autheray, Thank you for your time and answer. Mainly for making me feel like I'm not the only one in the "fertilizer burn" club!! Dawn thanks again. We'll do on the update! Happy growing!!

How do I tell the difference between over fertilizing and a phosphorus deficiency? I have been fertilizing my seedling roughly weekly with miracle grow quick start (4,12,4) at half strength. The lower leaves (and veins) are turning very purple and curling. They are hard and crumbly on the edges. The new growth looks healthy. The seedlings are about 6-12inches tall. I am growing under grow lights. I just added Epsom salts (1 tbs/gallon) and half strength fert 2 days ago...how long until I would see a difference if it was a phosphorus deficiency?? I’m really wondering whether I should wait for the fertilizer/Epsom salts to kick in or whether to flush them out because of over fert..

Thank you so much!

You're welcome.