curly top virus in CA central valley
 

Hi,

I was chatting with my neighbor this morning and he told me that he had heard on the news that there was some sort of really bad tomato disease showing up in the county (Merced) and nearby counties. He said it was caused by some insect coming down from the foothills that was "sort of like a cicada." I think he meant that it had a several year cycle of showing up in the area. I did a little research and came up with this very interesting article (at least to some of us in the central valley).

[URL]http://www.capitalpress.com/content/TH-tomatoes-w-photo-infobox-053113[/URL]

It's supposed to be a really bad year for tomatoes due to the virus. So I guess we all need to keep our eyes out for leafhoppers in the garden. (I think I've seen leaphopper nymphs in my garden, but will have to look up the specific type they mention in the article).

In the process of looking up the above "news" article, I came across another very interesting article about the tomato industry in Merced, which mentions tomato diseases in the county (some of which I didn't know we had).

[URL]http://cemerced.ucanr.edu/files/40380.pdf[/URL]

FWIW,
Anne

Anne,

That's interesting that shade is listed as one of the more effective controls. Thanks for the links.

Steve

Excellent links, thanks for sharing. I hope it won't be as bad as they're predicting.