Another Strange Condition
 

These 2 tomatoes were just harvested from a plant in a row of many other tomato and pepper plants. I mislabeled the variety so I don't know what it is, but is possibly Rebel Yell. Does anybody know what causes the yellow?

How far are you from Roswell I just saw your other thread.:lol:

Worth

From what I understand, it indicates a potassium deficiency in your soil.

It is a disorder known as yellow shoulders. Often heat related.
[url]https://agdev.anr.udel.edu/weeklycropupdate/?p=3457[/url]


KarenO

How about that! Yellow shoulders it is, which according to the article Karen provided also involves potassium defeciency.

Thank you for the info. Fortunately I only have 1 plant with this situation, and I think the remaining fruit are not afflicted.

Yellow shoulders is a similar condition as Blotchy ripening.
It doesn't indicate there are deficiencies of nutrients like K in the soil, but high stress factors on the plant can interfere with normal nutrient uptake and movement of nutrients to the fruit.

That is correct. it is multifactorial and heat is often implicated. I have some affected this year as well.

KarenO

My opinion, as stated in the quite similar recent thread is that most likely is due to high pH, excess Ca. These are the only problems I saw in some friend's garden with similar problems. It's just a not really proven observation (of course, high Ca could maybe mean lack of K absorption, but then I don't understand why the taste was surprisingly good.).

It's a funny thing that you should say that. Before I knew that this was a condition, I always tried to buy seeds that showed pictures of fruits with yellow shoulders. When I was a newbie, I grew some tomatoes that had yellow shoulders and they were THE BEST tomatoes of the year as far as flavor went. I just did not remember which variety that they were. Now I wonder if it was the yellow shoulders or the variety that made these maters taste so very good to me.