Tomato Plant Cleanup

[Bruinwar]

First I pull all the fruit. Then I chop the plants out of the stakes/baskets & put them in manageable piles, about the size of a wheelbarrow load. All the stakes/baskets get stacked & moved to a storage location on site. Then I wait a day or so.

The plants in the piles relax nicely & I can easily toss them into a wheelbarrow & load them in my truck. For years I've rented a U-Haul (around $50 including gas & dump fee) but this year I have a 2003 F150 with 156000 miles! I love my truck. Off to the municipal compost site where I pay a $15 fee to dump them.

Somewhere I read & believed for years that you should never compost tomato plants because of the fungal spores. But since then the compost experts I've talked to said that the spores don't survive. Other than that if the compost is more than 3 years old, don't the spores die anyhow?


-joe

[brownrexx]

Early blight spores definitely overwinter in the soil and my compost pile it not a hot pile so who knows about there. Compost experts may not realize that not everyone's compost pile is hot enough to kill pathogens.

Other pathogens also survive in the soil so I don't like moving my dead plants all around the property. I just load them and all of the dropped tomatoes into my Gator and dump them at the edge of the property in the undeveloped area.

[GoDawgs]

Over the weekend Pickles removed the tomato plants from the buckets by the house.
The plants went to Mt. Brushmore down in the back by the woods. That's where all the sticks, fallen limbs and big garden debris go. This spring it was a pretty big pile but as always it has composted down by half. Yesterday the tomato plants were covered by a mass of Lady pea vines I yanked out. In a day or two they will be joined by the Knucklehull pea vines.

We were going to play with keeping some of the buckets by the house and putting lettuce, etc (kitchen garden stuff) in them but the thrill is gone and garden burnout is in play so the bucket soil will be added to garden beds that need more.

The five tomatoes in buckets down in the garden are still going, as are the four new fall plants that are just starting to produce.

[bower]

I believe Early Blight is one of the diseases that can only survive on plant debris, not in the soil. So the heat of the compost pile shouldn't matter, more important is to ensure all the debris is covered or buried so the spores can't be spread if the plant material is still not broken down over winter.
https://extension.umaine.edu/ipm/ipd...cations/5087e/
"Remove and destroy crop residue at the end of the season. Where this is not practical, plow residue into the soil to promote breakdown by soil microorganisms and to physically remove the spore source from the soil surface."



Not all tomato diseases are only on debris though, and there sure are some that survive in soil, I found this great page of summaries for every imaginable disease, and where they survive:
https://hgic.clemson.edu/factsheet/t...ses-disorders/


So the safety of composting the plants for garden use would depend on the disease that's present (and in some cases, how well you bury it).

[JRinPA]

Most vegetables I cut off, to leave the intact roots in the soil for the worms. The roots are also there for the grubs, which is a drawback, but the pluses are greater.

Tomatoes though, they get pulled and disposed off in the trash. There are too many diseases to risk it. I've never been much for burning here in town, or I would burn them up. Then I either plant a fall manure mix or mulch over it with shredded leaves or wood chips. This year I may do horse manure before the leaves. Each year is a little different but as a rule I don't leave tomato roots in ground or compost anything except disease free tomato plants.

[Labradors2]

Good stuff Bower!

I think I am on the right track with pulling the plants along with the roots and disposing of all the debris that I can find. We have a large property so I pile it far away from the veggie garden.

This year has been bad for Septoria, which is deposited by the rain and dew. It isn't just the tomatoes that are affected, but many of the wild shrubs too. Not much I can do about that.

I grow 7 container tomatoes on my deck and I haul them under the awning before it rains. The leaves are still in great shape .

Linda

[brownrexx]

Excellent links bower but I do question about plowing under the debris allowing microbes to kill the Early blight fungal spores.

I remove all plants and roots at the end of the season and do not compost them. I roto till in the Fall so any debris remaining will be tilled under. If this would kill the spores, then I should not see any EB the following year.

However I still get some Early blight every year starting at the bottom of the plants so I am sure it is coming up from the soil. I don't get a lot of EB. I do mulch around the plants to prevent soil splashing and I leave decent space between plants for air movement.

Everything that I have read tells me that removing all debris totally from the garden will limit future diseases I just don't believe that "plowing it under" as the Univ of Maine recommends will kill it.

[Labradors2]

Brownrexx, since you destroy all the debris, I just wonder if the EB is possibly coming in on your seeds? Fermenting ought to kill it though right?

Linda

[brownrexx]

I don't save my own seeds nor do I trade any. My seeds are always new in packets and I kind of doubt that they are infected but that's not a guarantee of course.

For EB prevention, the Univ of Maine suggests plowing the debris under so that he soil microbes can destroy the spores but they also say to rotate the location every 3 years so that tells me that they don't believe that all will be destroyed under the soil either.

[GrowingCoastal]

Originally Posted by bower

I believe Early Blight is one of the diseases that can only survive on plant debris, not in the soil. So the heat of the compost pile shouldn't matter, more important is to ensure all the debris is covered or buried so the spores can't be spread if the plant material is still not broken down over winter.
https://extension.umaine.edu/ipm/ipd...cations/5087e/
"Remove and destroy crop residue at the end of the season. Where this is not practical, plow residue into the soil to promote breakdown by soil microorganisms and to physically remove the spore source from the soil surface."



Not all tomato diseases are only on debris though, and there sure are some that survive in soil, I found this great page of summaries for every imaginable disease, and where they survive:
https://hgic.clemson.edu/factsheet/t...ses-disorders/


So the safety of composting the plants for garden use would depend on the disease that's present (and in some cases, how well you bury it).

There's a great explanaiton of BER in the second link. Thks for posting it, Bower.

[Solanum315]

Originally Posted by SQWIBB

Last year I chopped and dropped the entire plant, this year I plan on doing it a bit differently.
I just took out two plants they were doing ok, but they needed to go.
From these I cut at soil level, leave roots intact, tear off the green tomatoes and toss in a bucket with healthy foliage (for compost), the rest goes into the firepit.

Have you tried fried green tomatoes? Also I have found that pasta sauce made from green cherry and beefsteak tomatoes is usually better than red because when they fully mature, they are a little too sweet and I prefer pasta sauce more acid and less sweet. Just something to consider even though feeding the compost pile is important too.

[SQWIBB]

Solanum315
Never tried green fried tomatoes but have pickled them. I don't bother with a lot of that stuff because to be honest, I'm the only one that eats the stuff.

[rhines81]

Originally Posted by AlittleSalt

I grew in containers and cut the tomato plants down to a 5 inch stem. Removed the plant. The roots will disintegrate over a few months. (I'm not saying this is the right or wrong way of doing things - just what I experienced).

For potted tomato plants, even though I hate to do it, I dump all of the pot off-site, soil and everything. One year I had horn worms pretty bad and their moths lay eggs everywhere especially in the potting soil. Dumping the soil took care of a repeat from the year before, although it was at a co$t.

[bower]

Re Early Blight - I read elsewhere that the conidia (spore containing structures) can survive on the soil surface. So while tilling under should help, there's still a risk that these basically not visible structures could be turned up again and some remain at the surface level where they can be activated by rain or wind to release spores.
Also, EB has alternate hosts in all the solanacea family - eggplant, pepper, potato and the nightshade weeds.

I just realized that there are unrotted tomato stalks in my last year's compost pile (last thing added in the fall and not properly covered) and this may be affecting my potato patch as several plants have turned yellow. Doh.

[Labradors2]

Originally Posted by rhines81

For potted tomato plants, even though I hate to do it, I dump all of the pot off-site, soil and everything. One year I had horn worms pretty bad and their moths lay eggs everywhere especially in the potting soil. Dumping the soil took care of a repeat from the year before, although it was at a co$t.

Are you sure about the eggs? Whilst it is possible that there would be pupa in the potting soil, and the 2" long brown pupa would be super easy to spot, I didn't think the moths would lay eggs in the soil, but on the leaves. When caterpillar eggs hatch, they need a food source right away which is why they are usually laid on the underside of leaves.

Linda