Blossom end rot?

[Dinahsb]

I have given my tomatoes food with calcium but I found this today. The tomato was on the ground when I found it.

[Labradors2]

It happens! Usually due to uneven watering. Sometimes the first tomatoes will have BER and then they will grow out of it....

Linda

[Dinahsb]

Thanks Linda! They are in containers. I'm also not sure. They got knocked over a few days ago by lawnmower guys. I found that tomato in the grass today.

[ContainerTed]

Blossom End Rot (BER) is not caused only by calcium deficiency. Most BER is caused by stress to the plant. Think of it this way. The plant is stressed for some reason. Not enough water, too much water, or disease. This causes this plant, a living entity, to begin survival mode. It will then begin to do the things which will allow it to survive, and that could mean to abort fruit which are taking too much moisture or too much of the available nutrients. It is easy to see that a living entity will do whatever necessary to survive.

So, if you are looking for a cause, then look to anything that would cause your plants to go into survival mode. Some tomatoes are more susceptible to BER than others. In my garden, Costoluto Genovese is the one that will show BER before any other of the approx. 1000 varieties I grown. I had more than 250 varieties in my 2012 garden and all were perfect, except for Gostoluto Genovese which had BER on mot of the set fruits - 37/40.

Stress is the most common cause. Inadequate or infrequest water is probably the most common cause.

[taboule]

What Ted said >> Inadequate or infrequent water is probably the most common cause.

Considering they are in containers, they dry up quicker than if in the ground.

[Gardeneer]

Let me ask this : WHAT WAS THE VARIETY ?, any plum, Roma, ...?

[carolyn137]

We had a recent thread here about BER and here's the link

http://www.tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=40981

I think it's in post #3 that Mike linked to my article about BER at Victory Seeds that Mike had asked me to write, and that means I don't have to write here what has already been written by me elsewhere.

Hoping in advance that it might help as to the many factors/variables that are involved with BER.

Carolyn

[ContainerTed]

Here's the link Carolyn is referring to. This is excellent information that has been reviewed by hundreds, if not thousand of tomato growers. Lots of questions are answered in this one.

http://www.webgrower.com/information/carolyn_ber.html

[hovermother22]

Such an interesting article. Thanks for posting!

[OzoneNY]

I just switched to tomatoes less prone to BER. I had bad BER with Romas and a few others but I just dont fight that battle any more.

[carolyn137]

Thank you Ted for linking to it directly, and reading through that again ,written so many years ago I'd like to add the following.

I did not write about what's called internal BER and that you can see if you cut open a fruit and it's black inside but no evidence of anything wrong externally,and that's because the lack of Ca++ never got as far to the blossom end.

Also,I said that sprays of Ca++ don't help, and that's still a controversial area,but sprays have been used on small green fruits,the epidermis is not as firm,it's more porous, and some feel that is does help.

I didn't speak to container growing either, but others have, and yes, more possible problems if groing in containers with different artificial mixes,added dried compost,etc,so addition of Ca++ might help.

Yes,back then it said I'd grown only about 1000 or so varieties,I don't remember the exact number but now it's 4,000 plus and still going up,but since Dec of 2004 when I fell and severed all 4 quads in my right leg and permanently in a walker,no more growing for me.

But each year I give seeds to someone,now it's Rob,who is local,and he brings my seedlings to me and Freda, who does all the outside stuff here, when she's not working at her own job or babysitting her grandchild, plants and takes care of them,most are in containers of various sizes and some in a large raised bed.

What I'm going to do with 17 plants this summer,I mean the fruits,I'm not sure, and thats b'c Rob always brings extras as well that I hand out to others. Did so for Martha,who helps with meal preperation here and she said her DH had already put an order in for hybrids, and despite the fact that she loved the non hybrids I gave her last year,in my area hybrids still rule.

Aha,when she's here I can get her to harvest at least some fruits,same for Freda since she's a hybrid afficianado as well, besides,Freda and I often bump heads especially when she says that hybrids never get BER..

OK,if I'm tomato obsessed,as I have been for many decades,and that obsession is THE worst of of my obsessions,I can handle that.

Carolyn

[OzoneNY]

Nice article Carolyn. Nothing is of more value than good information from knowledgeable source. I appreciate it (as Im sure most do)

[joseph]

Originally Posted by OzoneNY

I just switched to tomatoes less prone to BER. I had bad BER with Romas and a few others but I just dont fight that battle any more.

I don't fight that battle either... If a variety exhibits BER I never plant it again. I don't save seeds from it. It and all it's descendants are simply gone from my garden.

[ContainerTed]

Joseph, that's exactly what I've done with Costoluto Genovese. When you have more than 200 plants and one is producing 80% fruits with BER, you just gotta accept the situation and move on. If I have a plant that shows BER and I can attribute it to something "I" have done, then that variety gets another chance.

[Dinahsb]

Cherokee purple and golden ? Can't remember. Both heirloom