Seedling leaf changes and death

[aclum]

Hi Steve,

AHH! I think you might be right! I came across this virus last night in checking out tomato bushy stunt, but never really followed up. Looking at the google images now (although I realize the images don't always match the search subject), it sure looks like whatever I've got!

Thanks for the county extension link. I'll send them a copy of my photo (and give them my plant if they'd like it for testing).

I haven't seen any leaf hoppers around, but I've had them in the past. I have had a partially open bag of Pro-Mix undercover on the patio for over a year now and I suppose that might have been infected??

Fortunately, at least for now, it looks like less than 1/4 of my seedlings have been infected. Well, off to send an e-mail to extension and do a little research of BCTV!

Thanks again - it's good to have a better idea of what I might be dealing with! I sure hope whatever it is, is "fixable."

Anne

[aclum]

Hi Steve (et. al.),

I talked to Scott at the county extension about my tomato problems and followed up with an e-mail with photos posted here as well as the photo of my "dissected" Margaret Curtain. Got an e-mail back from him this morning. He said it wasn't immediately clear what was going on so he sent the photos on to some colleagues at UC for more opinions.

Thanks for recommending that I contact the extension!

BTW, when I talked to Scott on the phone he told me that he thought it was a little too early in the season for BCTV, but that it was quite prevalent in the area last year.

Will keep you posted.

Anne

[aclum]

Hi all,

Well, another entry from what is becoming my garden of the grotesque (that's GROtesque - not GROWtesque, BTW)!

This time, a NOT Liz Birt (from Liz Birt package but wrong leaf type). Besides the usual stunting and twisting of leaves, etc., I just noticed that this plant seems to be developing weird little fruit at the top of the plant !

It happens to be a grafted plant and, goofy as it may seem, I'm beginning to suspect that one particular batch of 105 rootstock that I tried to force may have had some chromosomal damage that was passed onto the scions. But I think there's more than one thing going on.... Sent the photo and others onto the experts who are trying to identify my problem(s).

Anne

[Heritage]

Thanks for the update, Anne. That is great Scott showed an interest, I hope he has the time to do some testing/examination on a few of your infected plants. Good luck with the diagnosis, please keep the updates coming!

Steve

[Heritage]

Anne, also, I think you might remember this thread and post of Naysen's last spring :
http://www.tomatoville.com/showpost....&postcount=525
When I examined his plants, the growing tips were very similar to yours in appearance. It does seem early in the year to have such a bad infestation of russet mites, but I notice Naysen's post was only one month later than yours. (last year) Until you get a diagnosis from the experts I would continue the spray regiment for russet mites. (as recommended on the label)

[aclum]

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the link to the photo from Naysen's old post. I remember the problems with thrips, russet mites, fusarium, and verticillium, but had forgotten about the actual photos. The photos sure do look similar to what's been going on with some of my plants. I last sprayed the planats with sulfur a week ago and I'll try to do a second application tomorrow if it's not too windy out (like it is today).

The number of healthy plants out in the garden is slowly decreasing - although I still have about 20 of the 40 I started out with still in the garden. Have several more I'll definitely pull, once I know if Scott at the extension or his associates might want to examine them or not.

I potted up about 50 more seedlings (many duplicates) that should be ready to plant out in another week or so - and have a bunch of new seedlings going indoors about ready to go from "dense planting" in a flat to 3 or 5 oz cups. So, provided I can put a stop to whatever's causing the problem, I'll just be about a month behind of my first plant-out of March 15 - which isn't too horribly awful, I guess.

Thanks for you interest in my tomato problems! I'll keep you posted on things.

Anne

P.S. Think I may have another plant about to meet the same end as my Margaret Curtain - but not quite there yet. Will post a photo to my Margaret Curtain thread if it came out OK (the photo, I mean).

[Heritage]

Anne,

I had this bookmarked for winter reading but so far have only had time to skim it. It is specific to your area so there might be something useful or interesting to you:
http://apsjournals.apsnet.org/doi/pd...PDIS-94-1-0099

Steve

[aclum]

Hi Everyone,

Looks like Cole was right regarding herbicide damage. Got this from Scott this morning:
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Regarding the initial problem, I have heard back from my colleagues and we all agree that this looks to be a herbicide drift issue and not a virus. It is unlikely to be a virus because 1) viruses are not transferred thru seeds and 2) the timing of infection is off — there are simply few viruses that infect tomatoes floating around at this time. Furthermore, the second set of photos show to me to be early-onset Roundup drift symptoms developing, tho these symptoms can also be caused by some other herbicides in a similar chemical grouping that are commonly used for turf weed control. You should send me some pictures of the plants now to see if they are progressing as I would expect.
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I sent him more photos a bit later in the morning and here's his most recent reply:

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thanks for these new photos, which are much more clear than the others.

Now I’m not so confident that the culprit is Roundup, but I am confident you are dealing with a herbicide drift/contamination issue, and one of the ALS/Auxin class of herbicides. This could have come from a variety of sources: your own lawn or a neighbors, from weed and feed type of products, or a direct herbicide application to the lawn while the plants were still in the greenhouse or shortly after being moved outside. Or they could have picked it up from compost if you used city of Merced compost (the herbicides are in the clippings and bioaccumulate in the compost). There are lots of different ways these plants could have been exposed, but the symptoms, pattern, etc, match herbicide as the problem and not mites, disease, or light.
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I actually did fill my beds with county compost - but that was about 6 years ago with no new additions and no herbicide related problems in the past. BTW, his mention of "light" refers to me asking him if the blue swimming pool cover over the greenhouse might have affected things.

It is very likely that the gardeners might have used weed and feed on the lawn and also possible the city or another neighbor might have used something like roundup on the weeds growing in the alley between our yard and the yard across the alley.

While plants showing moderate signs of affliction became worse, the ones that weren't affected when I first noticed the problem have, for the most part, remained healthy. Scott also noted that the herbicide damaged plants were unlikely to recover or, even if they recovered, they'd have poor or no production to speak of.

So... based on Scott's comments as well as comments from posters, esp. on the stunting thread, I'll going to go ahead and replace all but about 6 of my original 40 plants with fresh transplants. Hum - just thought of something....

He'd told me that it was OK to replant in the same soil because roundup was a systemic and didn't affect the soil. BUT, if so then why would the city compost contain herbicide residue? I think another e-mail to Scott may be in order.

Anyway, that's where things stand right now. Will let you all know if I hear anything else. Thanks everyone who took an interest in the problem and posted responses!

Anne

P.S. Thanks for the link Steve, it does look like interesting reading.

[Heritage]

Anne, if you get a chance would you post the sequence of photos you sent Scott? There are subtle differences between viruses, herbicide damage, and russet mite damage. I am fairly confident that is not herbicide damage.
Steve

[Cole_Robbie]

What if the owner of the mine that processed the diatomaceous earth had weeds growing around his place? Or the various shipping and packaging companies who handled the product. If it is made to absorb oil spills, no one would notice the herbicide contamination. Maybe you just lost the DE lottery. You should definitely try some different media, mostly because it is such an easy experiment. The plants in cups look like the herbicide stress, but that last plant looks like it is growing at Chernobyl. Even my stressed plants took off when planted in the ground. One variety had almost zero production, but the others got less of the bad compost product and did ok. Maybe you have both problems.

[RayR]

Originally Posted by Cole_Robbie

What if the owner of the mine that processed the diatomaceous earth had weeds growing around his place? Or the various shipping and packaging companies who handled the product. If it is made to absorb oil spills, no one would notice the herbicide contamination. Maybe you just lost the DE lottery. You should definitely try some different media, mostly because it is such an easy experiment. The plants in cups look like the herbicide stress, but that last plant looks like it is growing at Chernobyl. Even my stressed plants took off when planted in the ground. One variety had almost zero production, but the others got less of the bad compost product and did ok. Maybe you have both problems.

The Diatomite mine is out in the Nevada desert, I don't think anyone would be spraying herbicides there.

[aclum]

RayR,

Thanks for the information on DE. Good to know.

Cole,

Yes, I think "Chernobyl" is an apt (if a bit exaggerated) description of some of my plants. I'm still using the DE for seed starting, but I have repotted all my larger seedlings in Happy Frog Potting Soil - with no added fertilizers, etc. by me. So far the plants seem happy in their new temporary home.

Steve,

Thanks for your continued interest in things! I'll start posting the photos in another post. I keep losing everything with too many photos added and I don't want to lose what I've written so far, so I'll go ahead and post this, then start working on the photos.

Anne

[aclum]

Hi Steve,

Here's the first batch of photos. Note that I have photos of 2 different BTD Hearts - one in a cup and one in the ground.

Photos are:

BTD Heart in ground taken 3-24
BTD Heart in ground taken 4-7
BTD Heart in cup taken 4-2
BTD Heart in cup taken 4-7
Coustralee taken 3-24
Coustralee taken 4-7

Anne

[aclum]

Hi Steve,

Here's the second batch of photos

[aclum]

Hum.... for some reason I can't seem to download more photos at the moment. I get a website not found message when trying to upload. I'll try again later.

Anne