Vegetable Gardening

[OakLeaf]

Hmmmm. If it's just the one variety and all your plants are getting the same amount of water, maybe it has greater calcium needs than the other tomatoes? Maybe try top dressing with a little bone meal?

I'm not having much success controlling whatever disease my tomatoes have. I've got a couple more tricks up my sleeve for tomorrow after it stops raining, but right now it doesn't look good.

[GLC1968]

You know, that's a really good idea! I'd ruled out a calcium problem because the other varieties were fine, but why it never occurred to me that they may have different needs is beyond me! Duh! Would eggshells work, you think? Or I *may* have some blood & bone meal left from last year... Thanks for the ideas!

[OakLeaf]

I got curious and started googling the extension services.

They recommend a foliar spray of calcium chloride to control blossom end rot in established plants. I used to use the stuff to curdle tofu, but there are issues if too much of it gets into the soil and its use in "organic" agriculture is iffy (safest and most accepted in just that application, though).

Maybe try whirling some eggshells and water in the blender to use as a foliar spray? Just a thought.

Another thing I read is that plants that have a lot of fast, leafy growth are more susceptible to blossom end rot, because nitrogen is involved as well. Maybe that's why your one variety is affected?

[GLC1968]

Yeah, I thought about the nitrogen issue, too. We have high nitrogen levels in some of our soil due to the chicken coop - but that's mostly the 'row garden' area and most of the plants that have the problem are in the boxes (which is fairly controlled as these particular boxes are new this year). We do have one plant of this same variety in the row area, but it looks just like the rest of the diseased ones (no better or worse).

I'll try the eggshell spray on one plant - it probably can't hurt, right? If it works, I can do more. All of the plants have a new crop of tiny tomatoes, so hopefully if I treat them soon enough, these will develop well. I've been trying to pull off all the end rot ones right away so that the plant doesn't waste any energy on them. Not sure if that matters or not, but that's my brains' logic for you!

[OakLeaf]

Not sure if that matters or not, but that's my brains' logic for you!

http://www.ces.ncsu.edu/depts/pp/not...otes/vg19.htm:

Removing affected fruits when symptoms are first observed may be worthwhile for subsequent development of other fruit on the plant. This is particularly recommended for tomatoes.

[spokewench]

Here is a whole sink full of rainbow chard that I harvested this morning with a couple of zucchinis.

Oh, boy can't wait for that Italian style soup tonight!

[spokewench]

And, here is the result. One bag of stems, two great huge stuffed bags of chard leaves.