Grafting tomatoes as an alternative to Methyl Bromide

[JackE]

With the banning of methyl bromide fumigant, Florida growers are desperate for a viable alternative. Nematodes and other soil pathogens are a major problem in light, sandy soils (which includes mine) because most biological control measures are ineffective in soils without much organic matter.

In Japan, China and Africa, grafting desirable tomato varieties onto a hardy rootstock has proved very effective, and one technique, called "tube grafting," sounds pretty simple and may be something we can do ourselves. Grafting has even been used to successfully grow tomatoes in highly saline soil, and other difficult environments that would normally be considered impossible.

Sounds promising for the future.

Has anyone here experimented with this? I wonder what kind of rootstock is used - some hardy weed maybe?

Jack

[Mischka]

See: http://tomatoville.com/showthread.php?t=16538&highlight=grafting

and

http://tomatoville.com/showthread.ph...light=grafting

[JackE]

Thanks for the link, Mischka. That discussion seems to center on increased productivity, which wasn't even mentioned in the article I just read. This is all about overcoming soil pathogens without dangerous chemicals. Many southern gardeners have actually had to quit gardening because of root knot nematodes - especially organic growers.

I wonder if you could just graft a tomato plant to some hardy weed growing in your garden? Wouldn't that be something!

Jack

[JackE]

Mischka - that second link was what I was looking for. So several people are trying it this year - guess we'll see some results later. I hope someone lets me know because I don't surf the forum. I'm always right here.

It can't be too hard. I read (Wikipedia) that in Japan they graft them literally by the millions! They use a silicone tube with a special clip - looked like the scion and rootstock were just cut-off square rather than on an angle. As they say in the discussion here, the key is keeping the plants stress-free while it heals.

Jack

edit - We have some really tough and noxious weeds in the nightshade family, I think. Hmmm..........:-)

Right now fully half of my growing acreage is fallow because of root knot nem infestation! We used resistant varieties successfully for awhile, but last year the nems broke through the resistance. So it will be out-of-production for at least 2 more years until the nems are starved-out. I had to plow-up 2 acres of pasture last winter in order to have a garden at all. I'll send a lab sample to A&M this fall to see how they are doing.

[Dutch]

Jack - I will start a new tread on my tomato grafting project, once I have actually grafted some plants together. The growing season is much later here in Wisconsin. My canidates for grafting have just resently been planted. I actually started planting some of each, 3 weeks ago, just to get a feel of the germation rate and the growth speed. Check back in 2 weeks.
Dutch

[Suze]

Originally Posted by JackE

With the banning of methyl bromide fumigant, Florida growers are desperate for a viable alternative. Nematodes and other soil pathogens are a major problem in light, sandy soils (which includes mine) because most biological control measures are ineffective in soils without much organic matter.

Jack, I know you started this thread to ask about grafting, but for the last couple of years, I've used a product called Teracure with great success in limiting or even mostly preventing root knot nematode damage. I suspect you aren't going to find much about this product doing google searches though, and most of what you might find will likely apply to turf.

It's a custom blend that Poulenger does up in-house I think (http://www.poulengerusa.com/) and last time I looked, you won't see it listed on their website. You've got to call and ask for it.

More or less, it's similar to Dragonfire, same active ingredient (wild sesame oil), but in a more dilute formulation with an emulsifier and some molasses added.

I go with the Teracure blend that Poulenger does because it is more practical to run through my EZ-FLO fertigation tank. All I have to do is dump it in and set the rate w/o worrying about adding emulsifiers and such. I think they probably add the molasses because that does help with RKN as well. In fact, I also broadcast some dried molasses before planting out.

The Dragonfire CPP would also work depending on your needs and what type of watering or fertigation system you've got in place.

Both of them can be applied by hand if need be, but you don't want to get it on the foliage, or if you do, rinse off immediately afterward before it dries. These products normally get applied ~1x/month when a susceptible crop is in and when soil temp exceeds 65F. (RKN are not active when soil temp is < 65F)

I used to use a product called Dazitol (mustard based) and while it worked fairly well, these sesame oil products seem to be much more effective in my experience.

Hope this helps.

[JackE]

Hi Suze --

I sure does help! And I am very grateful for your time and interest.

I think y'all might have a little better soils over there than we do. As I'm sure you know, these Deep East Texas acidic, coarse "pine tree soils" are just about pure sand without much organic matter, and won't hold amenments due to leaching.

South Florida soils are very similar to ours and the U of FL has done extensive research and testing on every biological control and management technique - cover crops, solarization, flooding, fallowing (the list goes on and on), and a couple years ago they tested every organic nematicide on the market, including Dragonfire. Most of the products had some suppressive activity, but only in the presence of substantial organic matter. The bottom line seems to be that it's the percentage of organic matter that is the significant variable and none of the biological products performed significantly better than an untreated control patch high in organic content.

Nematodes don't like organic matter. At one time, I put seven large dump-truck loads of compost on a 2000 sq ft garden. It did well that year, but by season's end it had all washed away and leached out with the rains and I was back to sterile sand. the Lord created this land for pine tree production, not tomatoes! :-)

This research is really in high gear now, with the fumigants gone, and two developments stand-out as promising - regular soalrization but with molasses under the plastic and a fungicidal product called MeloCon. Melocon contains a live nematode-eating fungus from Africa and must be kept frozen until the moment of application- very expensive, air freight from Calif etc. I suspect that both of these developmens will be contingent on organic content.

I have spent so much money and time on new miracle cures for so many years that I'm skeptical of all of them. As a home gardener, I immediately jumped on every new idea - elbin rye, marigolds, mustard, solarization under plastic - I 've done it all. Every time I was so enthusistic and hopeful, only to be disappointed. The only thing that really does work, in my fifty years of fighting RKN, is to move the garden to fresh ground and clean fallow the infected area, with discing or herbicide, for at least two years. I used a middle buster plow on that land and cut 14" deep furrows. A moldboard plow is the best, but I don't have one. In any case, you have to starve them out or resort to a dangerously toxic chemical like Telone, Vydate, Vapam etc. Some people forget that they eat weed root too!

The two acres I am fallowing now is equipped with gravity-flow drip irrigation and fertilizer injection. But the land we are now using is under sprinklers only. Have y'all had any rain over there? Bone dry here!

Jack

[JackE]

Thanks, Dutch.

Jack

[carolyn137]

Nematodes don't like organic matter. At one time, I put seven large dump-truck loads of compost on a 2000 sq ft garden. It did well that year, but by season's end it had all washed away and leached out with the rains and I was back to sterile sand. the Lord created this land for pine tree production, not tomatoes! :-)

*****

Nematodes don't like organic matter for the following reason.

They move from sand grain to sand grain via the watershell around each sand grain and that's how they build up to destructive populations. Add lots of organic matter and that does help since the farther apart the sand grains are the less likely are the RKN's to increase in numbers.

And it has worked well for some to keep the populations under control. What was in that compost that you say washed out just with rain? I guess that surprises me a bit.

And as to grafting onto most rootstocks, whether they be Maxifort or Beaufort or some of the others, and for disease tolerance, the genes in the rootstocks are pretty much the same as you'd find in known F1 hybrid tomatoes.

Dr. David Francis at Ohio State has worked with several different kinds of rootstocks both for indoor and outdoor growing and feels that using Celebrity F1 as a root stock is just as good as most of the known ones.

After reading a lot about grafting for disease tolerance, which I did for certain others, not for myself, I came to the tentative conclusion that grafting for same gave about the same extension of time as did something like Celebrity F1.

My point being that the genes that give some tolerance to most soilborne diseases, whether they be already bred into a known variety or present in grafting rootstock, only give perhaps a week or two more plant life and time for fruit ripening. But that can be a huge advantage to those commercial growers who use Brix values to determine when to harvest.

If you ask some of our Tville members from Australia and NZ about grafted plants, which are very commonly sold in those two countries, I think they'd tell you that the only win situation is to those who sell them in terms of making money since those grafted plants cost much more and at least for the home owner and small scale commercial farmer they see no distinct advantage.

I have many tomato friends who live in parts of the US who have really bad times with RKN's, mostly those in FL, along the Gulf Coast and then up into CA. The lsit is long of what they've tried to use, and Suze, I don't think many of them know the products you talked about and wish they did know and will pass that along, b'c many end up growinig in containers when they don't want to. Making new raised beds with known fill has wroked for many as well.

Suze, I've seen your pictures of your raised beds with wonderfully healthy tomato plants. Was your fill for those beds OK to start with and then somehow RKN's got in there from plants you bought that were already infected? Just curious.

Just throwing out some thoughts here.

[JackE]

And it has worked well for some to keep the populations under control. What was in that compost that you say washed out just with rain? I guess that surprises me a bit.

Carolyn, I exaggerated a bit. It didn't all leach-out in just "one year." It was a several-year project to sustain an organic content in this sandy soil, which proved impossible. Starting With all that compost - which came from a company that made utility poles and consisted of pine bark and limbs (VERY old and completly composted) - I continued to add large amounts of organic mater of every kind, including various manures and chicken litter, tons of leaves, even dead animals. I managed the naturally low pH with lime, but it was a losing battle. It leached-out faster than I could replace it.

I finally gave-up and just began to garden with a system that sadly amounts to hydroponic growing - the soil is devoid of nutrients and I furnish everything the crops need in a weekly chemical cocktail. It works. We produce a lot of stuff, but it's completely unnatural. There is in no viable alternative - other than growing pine trees, which is what everyone else does around here. :-)

Jack

PS - I now maintain pH with calcium nitrate instead of ammonia-derived nitrogen.

[GunnarSK]

Originally Posted by JackE

I finally gave-up and just began to garden with a system that sadly amounts to hydroponic growing - the soil is devoid of nutrients and I furnish everything the crops need in a weekly chemical cocktail. It works. We produce a lot of stuff, but it's completely unnatural. There is in no viable alternative - other than growing pine trees, which is what everyone else does around here. :-)

Jack

Apparently the Dutch use Litchi Tomatoes (solanum sisymbriifolium) to control RKN (mainly in potatoes), and apart from growing it plain as a trap crop (it works as an RKN magnet, but is an unsuitable host) it could probably be used as a grafting rootstock.

[feldon30]

Originally Posted by JackE

I think y'all might have a little better soils over there than we do. As I'm sure you know, these Deep East Texas acidic, coarse "pine tree soils" are just about pure sand without much organic matter, and won't hold amenments due to leaching.

I can attest to Suze's base "soil" being almost 100% white beach sand. There is no "loam" or "clay" to speak of, at least for the first few inches.


Surf's Up!

[JackE]

Litchi tomatoes - I'll have to look that up.

Corn is also a trap crop (unsuitable host) as are certain varieties of rye grass - and I think that's the mode of action for many brassica-type control crops - like rapeseed, etc. But none of stuff works without organic matter. I've tried everything there is! It's either lots of organic matter or a toxic fumigant - and there's not a whole lot of wiggle room between the two.

I can't believe I'm actually talking to someone in Poland! I'm 75 and this internet is like something out of an old Flash Gordon comic book. I have a newspaper that my mother saved tucked away in a cedar chest, dated Sept 2, 1939 - the headline in huge black letters is WAR - and the article below is entitled "German Forces Cross Polish Frontier." Perhaps I should donate it to a museum.

Jack

[JackE]

Hi Feldon. I wish I knew how to post pictures here. Haven't mastered that yet - or much of anything else with the computer other than running my mouth. :-)

Jack

[feldon30]

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