Leaf Diseases

[Garf]

Looks good to me. You obviously have it right for your situation.

[Structure]

Originally Posted by b54red

I can assure you that one of four things happened. One you mixed up a solution that was too strong. Two, you got hold of some bleach that was way too strong. Three the diseases were totally infecting the plant. Or four, the plants were sprayed in the bright hot sunshine with a fairly strong solution.
I only use Clorox brand bleach and I always check for the percentage of sodium hypochlorite and adjust accordingly.
I went out an hour ago and took these pictures of some of my plants. All of them have been sprayed at least 3 times and some 5 or 6 times since they were planted.
As you can see some like the Linnies Oxheart have lost a great number of their lower leaves but are still producing even after two freezing nights. The container plants are the youngest and were set out in mid to late September and have all been sprayed. I spray the complete plant not just the visibly diseased portion, though I am more thorough where I see disease and will only lightly spray the new growth.

I have been fighting a plethora of diseases this fall TSWV, Fusarium wilt, several leaf spot diseases, Early and Late Blight and a couple of leaf molds. There was a period of nearly a month when I was unable to get out and spray with either Daconil or the bleach solution and I paid dearly for it. I have been trying to spray more regularly since then but today was the first spraying in two weeks.

I'm pretty sure the plant's leaves were not all infected. I also struggle to see why having some fungal disease would result in automatic wilting and death of the entire leaf, but anyway, you are probably right about one of the others. I used Clorox brand bleach and did check the concentration. However, I may not have been careful about the sunlight issue. Perhaps next year I'll give it a conservative try on a plant or two and see what happens.

It's certainly reasonable for others to try this and observe their own results. My experience are my own, and I won't pretend I had everything "ideal." It's certainly great that folks are experimenting with solutions. This has the potential of being a great one. Just didn't work when I tried it (perhaps tried it wrongly!)

[b54red]

Filthy probably has the best idea of using the milder mix and using it more frequently. My experience was good when doing this but my lack of diligence would get me in trouble; but when I am able and especially early in the disease cycle I try to spray the milder solution and spray more often. Once the really hot weather gets here and the diseases become more aggressive I usually resort to the lazy method of spraying the stronger mix less frequently. That got me in big trouble with Late Blight this fall when I didn't spray with anything for nearly a month and ended up losing nearly half my plants to Late Blight. This year was only the second time I've ever had to deal with LB and it is not a fun experience. I thought TSWV was the worst but now have changed my mind. I'm glad it doesn't show up every year like most diseases.

When you live in an area with constant high humidity, extreme heat, persistent pests and nearly every soil born disease that can stunt or kill a tomato you do what you can to get a decent crop. As I have said in past posts this is not a perfect solution but has been the most effective thing I have used to slow or stop existing diseases. I still use Daconil as a preventative but it is very limited in what it will do once the diseases get started. My tomato season used to be only a couple of months long due to the diseases that usually overwhelmed my plants no matter how much fungicide I used. Now I frequently have plants live and produce for over 7 months and I have to conclude it is the use of the mild bleach solution. If I could now find a solution to the Fusarium wilt problem I could grow tomatoes for over 9 months. Occasionally I get a few that seem to be resistant and they sometimes last that long. I am growing some in containers but the constant watering required in the hot weather and the milder taste of the tomatoes grown in a soil free mix make them less than ideal for me.

[gill_s]

We are obviously lucky to some extent with our climate here in the Uk because we don't have such problems with disease. Late Blight now seems to be inevitable and we automatically spray for it from the end of August on the outdoor plants. Apart from Botrytis I have not had any other disease problems until this year, when I did get Bacterial Speck, which spread through most of my plants. I grow in hydroponics and containers. At the end of the season I have had a really thorough programme of cleaning and sterilising all equipment, greenhouse etc to try and avoid a repeat next year. I realise that this is impossible when growing in the field. I have also resisted the temptation to save any seed to prevent the problem being passed on through seeds.
In the areas where you have many tomato diseases are you unable to save seed or if you do does this perpetuate the problems?
I did use a bleach spray which helped to keep my crop going. I found that Kumato and Sugary showed very good tolerance to the Bacterial Speck.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by gill_s

We are obviously lucky to some extent with our climate here in the Uk because we don't have such problems with disease. Late Blight now seems to be inevitable and we automatically spray for it from the end of August on the outdoor plants. Apart from Botrytis I have not had any other disease problems until this year, when I did get Bacterial Speck, which spread through most of my plants. I grow in hydroponics and containers. At the end of the season I have had a really thorough programme of cleaning and sterilising all equipment, greenhouse etc to try and avoid a repeat next year. I realise that this is impossible when growing in the field. I have also resisted the temptation to save any seed to prevent the problem being passed on through seeds.
In the areas where you have many tomato diseases are you unable to save seed or if you do does this perpetuate the problems?
I did use a bleach spray which helped to keep my crop going. I found that Kumato and Sugary showed very good tolerance to the Bacterial Speck.

I wouldn't give up our climate and long growing season for less disease. Tomatoes grown around here have a very good flavor and that is why so many commercial tomato farms are in this area. Even the bullet proof hybrids that would be tasteless grown in many areas are actually pretty good when grown around here so you can imagine how good the better heirlooms taste. It is frustrating dealing with the constant pests and diseases but the rewards are worth it. I used to grow mainly those disease resistant hybrids but after having some limited success with heirlooms I could never be happy with only growing the hybrids. I still plant a few for insurance and have settled on Big Beef for the heat of late summer and Jetsetter for the cooler spring and late fall. Since you are growing mostly in containers and also inside, which varieties seem to have the best flavor to you? I have found a definite flavor deficit in the ones grown in containers without soil compared to the same ones grown in the garden.

I have had the various speck diseases and they don't seem to be as bad about ruining production if kept in check just a little. Spraying with Daconil early keeps it from developing rapidly and if it gets bad I use the bleach spray to stop the spread. TSWV seems to be a constant problem around here now and the commercial growers all use resistant varieties because if they didn't they could be wiped out in a mater of weeks. I just take my chances and keep plenty of replacement seedlings ready all year for the inevitable replanting of the unlucky ones.

I always ferment my seed and have found no difference in my saved seed and ones purchased in the incidence of disease. The biggest difference I have found is in the different varieties. Some varieties just seem to have no disease tolerance down here while others are nearly as good as the best of the hybrids at surviving the onslaught of diseases.

[Garf]

Most of the small plants that I thought were dead seem to have some life left in them. A few are shot, but not all.

[b54red]

I'm sorry for the situation you are in with your plants. Looks like you may have had something worse than leaf spot. That is why I always have replacement seedlings ready to go up til late September. Anything planted in September has only a slim chance of making it to full fruit size before a killing freeze here. When plants that small get hit hard by some diseases they really have only the slimmest of chances to grow into a large healthy plant. That is why for me growing fall tomatoes is such a challenge. I try to wait til the seedlings have truly hardened off before putting them in the garden or the bucket I am going to grow them in. I never set them out until they are at least a foot tall, then I pinch of half of the leaves and bury them really deep and hope they survive the first couple of weeks. I usually have at least twice as many seedlings as I will need because some will get sick before I consider them ready to plant and many will die soon after setting them out in the heat of late summer.

[Garf]

Those were my spares.

[gill_s]

Originally Posted by b54red

I wouldn't give up our climate and long growing season for less disease. Tomatoes grown around here have a very good flavor and that is why so many commercial tomato farms are in this area. Even the bullet proof hybrids that would be tasteless grown in many areas are actually pretty good when grown around here so you can imagine how good the better heirlooms taste. It is frustrating dealing with the constant pests and diseases but the rewards are worth it. I used to grow mainly those disease resistant hybrids but after having some limited success with heirlooms I could never be happy with only growing the hybrids. I still plant a few for insurance and have settled on Big Beef for the heat of late summer and Jetsetter for the cooler spring and late fall. Since you are growing mostly in containers and also inside, which varieties seem to have the best flavor to you? I have found a definite flavor deficit in the ones grown in containers without soil compared to the same ones grown in the garden.

I have had the various speck diseases and they don't seem to be as bad about ruining production if kept in check just a little. Spraying with Daconil early keeps it from developing rapidly and if it gets bad I use the bleach spray to stop the spread. TSWV seems to be a constant problem around here now and the commercial growers all use resistant varieties because if they didn't they could be wiped out in a mater of weeks. I just take my chances and keep plenty of replacement seedlings ready all year for the inevitable replanting of the unlucky ones.

I always ferment my seed and have found no difference in my saved seed and ones purchased in the incidence of disease. The biggest difference I have found is in the different varieties. Some varieties just seem to have no disease tolerance down here while others are nearly as good as the best of the hybrids at surviving the onslaught of diseases.

We do have some summer here in the UK!(I do live in the South). It is a short season, though. For outdoors I always choose early maturing varieties. Of those in 2010 We found that Bloody Butcher, Kimberley, Moravski Div, Clear Pink Early and Pale Perfect Purple were excellent for flavour and kept well. Most cherries perform well. In the greenhouse I grow the larger and later maturing varieties. This year KBX was superb but it was pink, not orange! ? wrong variety. Others which were very good were Golden Cherokee, Arbuznyi, Vorlon, Amazon Chocolate, Caro Rich, Rose de Berne, Goose Creek, I could go on. there were some disappointments such as Kosovo, Delicious and Anna Russian. I can see that containers will not be as good as growing in the garden but then we just do not have the garden space to be able to rotate. With containers it is crucial to get the feed right and we do limit the indeterminates to 1 or 2 stems.
As for disease prevention we do not have the range of products which you seem to have. Daconil is not available. Dithane( Mancozeb) is available and now Copper Oxychloride which I haven't yet tried. The organic copper fungicide is Bordeaux mixture. This coats everything with an opaque blue film. Surely this must limit photosynthesis. If this gets on the flowers it stops them setting. The idea is to cover the flower trusses with a jam jar. Very difficult!! I do agree that bleach solution does help.
Sorry if this post is too long!

[b54red]

Interesting that Kosovo didn't do anything for you. It did really well for me in the cool spring weather and also in the heat of summer. It did not do good as a fall plant this year. You might want to try Linnies Oxheart, it is doing better than any other heirloom this fall; but the plant gets really large.
Since you did good with PPP you might want to try Pruden's Purple or Caspian Pink, both are larger and to me more flavorful.
If you need a dark tomato I would recommend Berkley Tie Dye Pink. It did really good for me in the spring and is doing good right now in the cool weather of fall. I also had good luck with Carbon in the spring and fall.
Red Siberian and Neves Azorean Red also did good early in the spring and Red Siberian is doing good this fall. Druzba is also doing great in the fall and is a medium size tomato and compact plant. I would also recommend a hybrid called Jetsetter that is a terrific producer during the cooler months and has fairly good taste and is also fairly compact. I grew one in a container in the winter last year and it did better than any other container plant.

[gill_s]

Many thanks for your recommendations. I shall give them a try. I should probably try Kosovo again but undercover next time. It was reluctant to set fruits initially, therefore wasn't very productive then the Bacterial Speck hit it. The fruits I did get had yellow shoulders which put me off. I know from reading other posts how well it is regarded. I did grow Druzba but missed that off the 'good' list. It was outside and produced lovely blemish free and tasty fruits. I did it an injustice in forgetting it!
Gill

[Garf]

The 3 plants I thought I killed are coming back with a vengeance. No sign of disease in the new growth. It's a bit disconcerting and a bit drastic, but it does work.

[Dewayne mater]

The tops of my plants have survived. However, about 80% of leaves went from green to crispy dead with this treatment. I would call this the nuclear option, a last resort. Daconil, actinovate, serenade are all must less destructive options.

[b54red]

It is a nuclear option when dealing with something like Late Blight; but at least it stops the spread to your other plants if you spray soon enough. As long as you don't use too strong a solution or wait til the diseases have infected most of your plant the treatment is very effective. It does speed up the lose of diseased leaves. It does not kill healthy disease free leaves unless the solution is too strong. It will cause infected leaves to wither and die within a few days after spraying but the upside is what you have left is healthy. The option is to allow the disease to progress and kill the plant prematurely with very limited production or live with a plant that looks pretty bad for a week or two after the treatment. The fact that I have an abundant crop of tomatoes at the end of November in an area where most peoples' tomato season ends in July is all the proof I need. I lose plenty of plants due to TSWV and Fusarium wilt but rarely do I lose a mature plant to any kind of bacterial or fungal disease.
The first picture is of a Linnies Oxheart taken on the 24th and you can see it doesn't have many leaves on the bottom half of the plant but it is producing wonderfully. The others are Black Krim, BTD Pink, Druzba, and Jetsetter. It is pretty obvious that they have all lost a lot of leaves but the important thing is they are still relatively healthy and productive despite the lose of foliage. Had I not started using the treatment back in September when the diseases got bad few if any of these plants would still be alive.

[Garf]

With the low temps over winter, the foliar diseases have been minimal. I haven't sprayed for a month. Some sort of bug decimated my radish.