Starlight are you in north or south Alabama? It makes a huge difference in disease pressure. I only foliar feed to get rid of a deficiency like iron deficiency. I can't see much benefit in increasing the time the leaves stay wet unnecessarily in this humid climate but if it works for him then great.
I also had big bushy plants til about 3 weeks ago and then every thing changed almost overnight. I have noticed over many years that the first heavy disease pressure usually hits my plants about the time the first fruits are ready to pick and all of the plants are loaded down. I think maybe the stress of carrying a large load of fruit weakens the plants natural resistance to diseases. Purely anecdotal but an interesting observation to me. Right now I have a bed of plants that were set out about 5 weeks ago and they have been pretty much disease free while the older plants in the very next bed have been having a hard time of it. I don't think it will be too long before they start having problems too since many of the plants in the newer bed are getting some decent fruit set despite the heat, humidity and rain. I'm sure they would be doing much better if the rain would stop and I could give them a good dose of TTF.
Bill
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