ID please

[mashermike]

Hi,

This has wiped out all my tomatoes. Sungold and Cherokee Purple were last hold outs.



Sungold



Sungold



What's left of a very productive Big Beef.

[RayR]

The brown lesions with the tan centers looks like Septoria.

[kurt]

Originally Posted by mashermike

Hi,

This has wiped out all my tomatoes. Sungold and Cherokee Purple were last hold outs.http://www.ag.ndsu.edu/pubs/plantsci...rop/pp659w.htm



Sungold



Sungold



What's left of a very productive Big Beef.

For next year some tips for prevention of reoccurance.By the way welcome to T-ville.

[mashermike]

Thanks for the replies. I agree I need a plan for next year. I don't have the luxury of rotating garden plots. I could switch to containers.

Mike

[RayR]

Mike, before you can come up with a plan, you have to understand the enemy you are dealing with. First you have to identify who the enemy pathogen is, and then you have to do some research and understand how it got there, how it lives, how it reproduces, and how it survives to attack again the next season.
A lot of people post pictures here and on other forums of their sick plants and ask “ What is it?” Sometimes the problem is easy to identify from a picture, sometime not. Sometimes a description is also needed of how the problem started, what it looked like and how it progressed and over how long a period of time.
When I look at your pictures of the leaves which are pretty good and clear, I see what I have experienced some years ago with the fungal disease Septoria run amok. That’s not to say that you might also have some other opportunistic pathogen or insect that joined the party in the weakened state of the plant. You Southerners have more tomato diseases and bugs than I care to experience. If it is just Septoria, then the plant declined from the first signs of spots on the lower leaves to its current demise over a period of a month or more.

[b54red]

Mike I don't know where in Georgia you are located but down here in the southeastern corner of Alabama we had rain nearly every day for 5 weeks. I have been plagued by Septoria and also some Late Blight so you may have had both also. I have been able to keep most of my plants alive but there is no foliage on the bottom of any of the plants and most of the ones that got Late Blight are in bad shape or dead. I have found that it helps a great deal to keep them sprayed with Daconil if the rain permits and if it doesn't then spray every plant a couple of times a week with the diluted bleach spray. It helps a great deal in stopping the fast spread of both diseases. Another thing that will help is controlling the whiteflies that are terrible here right now. As soon as it is light enough I will be spraying the whiteflies today. I lost all of my blooms to the diseases caused by the constant rainfall and now that it seems to have stopped I am hoping that I still have time for some fruit set and production before the cold gets here. I fertilized my remaining live plants yesterday because the unbelievable amount of rainfall the past month has leached the soil in my raised beds and the plants were spindly and pale. Planting in containers will not help with these diseases unless you have them under cover.

[mashermike]

Thanks Ray,

The one month scenario you describe sounds about right. Early on (every year) I have to deal with Aphids and White flies ... it's a given. In addition, every year about mid-July I start to get foliage deterioration in some form. (early blight/septoria is my guess) We have late afternoon thunderstorms for weeks at a time and that really accelerates the bad news.

I try to use good practices .... heavy mulching with wheat straw, drip irrigation (the pvc lines you see are only used if auto drip system is not working), I try to buy healthy plants from known sources, I spray regularly with Actinovate, AACT, etc. Our home is in the middle of a bermuda pasture, so that's always creeping into the garden ... another given.

I spoke to a local commercial tomato grower a couple of years ago and she says they grow field tomatoes, but because of the imminent diseases, she grows the main crop in greenhouses. I'm seriously considering this route. I realize it's a learning curve and a new set of problems.

I've been growing tomatoes for over thirty years ..... can't give up now.

[mashermike]

Thanks b54red,

I live in Bulldog country near Athens. You hit the nail on the head with the rain we've had. This extended rainfall happens almost every summer. It's always bad news for my tomatoes. As you say, there are times when it rains every day so no time for sprays to be effective. The bleach spray sounds interesting.

Are you controlling the whiteflies with bleach only? It hasn't really clicked (until now) that they would be causing the fungus to spread faster.

RayR I've been pondering how I would go about making a positive ID of the enemies. That's a bit overwhelming .... as you say we have many potential enemies in the south. If these pathogen(s) are airborne or transferred by various insects it will be difficult. Another issue I have is bird damage once fruit is ripe.

What is your opinion of taking the whole garden uncover with a hoophouse/greenhouse?

Mike

[RayR]

Originally Posted by mashermike

RayR I've been pondering how I would go about making a positive ID of the enemies. That's a bit overwhelming .... as you say we have many potential enemies in the south. If these pathogen(s) are airborne or transferred by various insects it will be difficult. Another issue I have is bird damage once fruit is ripe.

What is your opinion of taking the whole garden uncover with a hoophouse/greenhouse?Mike

It isn't that hard to identify the most common fungal pathogens, Early Blight and Septoria. They are as common down South as they are up North.

Cornell has some good info and pictures on their site:

Early Blight

Septoria

Neither are transmitted by insects. Since the spores can go airborne growing undercover or in containers is no guarantee. The spores can survive on dead plant debris from your infected plants, so clean up every bit you can find, bag and trash or burn it. Till under to bury more spores.
I see you are using Actinovate and Compost Tea as a foliar treatment, that's good but what have you done about the soil biology? Do you inoculate with Mycorrhizae, Trichoderma and beneficial bacteria?

[mashermike]

Thanks,
I'll do some closer plant observation tomorrow. I already remove dead plant material, although there is always room for improvement. Yes, I do inoculate all roots with mycorrhizae. It was my understanding that my AACT provided beneficial bacteria. I am not familiar with Trichoderma. I'll have to look that one up.

[RayR]

What mycorrhizal inoculant are you using?

[mashermike]

http://www.plant-success.com/index.p...corrhizae.html

[mashermike]

RayR,

Here are a couple more pics:

This plant is showing fruit and stem damage that look like EB to me. It also shows lots of small black dots on stems that look like Septoria. This sungold is not in the main raised bed.


This is a Patio in a 5 gal bucket, growing in a mixture of sand, pinebark and perlite. It looks like it has EB to me. However there is no signs on fruit so far. This plant has stem lesions in addition to the leave damage. This plant was really healthy looking until the extended rains.


I noticed the Plant Success product I use contains Trichoderma so I think I'm ok there.

Rain yesterday, today .....

Thanks again for the help.
Mike

[RayR]

Yep, it looks like you got EB too. Lesions on fruit sometimes happens but I've never had that happen up here. I understand constant rain and humidity creates a perfect storm for fungal pathogens, I've been there. It makes it difficult to keep protective fungicides on the leaves too, Copper Soap (Soap Shield) is the best I've seen at handling rain. I used it for a couple of seasons a few years back and it did retard the spread of Septoria and EB.

I know Plant Success has Mycorrhizae and Trichoderma, but doesn't have any beneficial bacteria. You would have to move up to Great White in their product line for that.
You might want to consider Ami's preplant dip of MycoGrow Soluble, Actinovate and Biota Max instead. It's a pretty diverse combo of effective microorganisms that you can buy in smaller quantities but can treat a lot of plants.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by mashermike

Thanks b54red,

I live in Bulldog country near Athens. You hit the nail on the head with the rain we've had. This extended rainfall happens almost every summer. It's always bad news for my tomatoes. As you say, there are times when it rains every day so no time for sprays to be effective. The bleach spray sounds interesting.

Are you controlling the whiteflies with bleach only? It hasn't really clicked (until now) that they would be causing the fungus to spread faster.

RayR I've been pondering how I would go about making a positive ID of the enemies. That's a bit overwhelming .... as you say we have many potential enemies in the south. If these pathogen(s) are airborne or transferred by various insects it will be difficult. Another issue I have is bird damage once fruit is ripe.

What is your opinion of taking the whole garden uncover with a hoophouse/greenhouse?

Mike

Mike the bleach spray has no affect on the whiteflies. For that I use many different combinations of things such as soapy water, Permethrin, Insect Growth Regulator, and essential oils. They are very hard to control sometimes and can require frequent alternating spraying of the different substances to keep them at bay.