Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: Totty on February 12, 2011, 20:56
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I have a really nice mixture of new F1s and heritage tomato seed for this year. Around six-8 will be greenhouse grown and another 10 grown on the plot.
Is blight the ,main reason for more people not growing toms outside?
I grew a couple of Gardeners delight last year in some spare room and thbey were fine, but have dedicated them their own bed this year.
I saw in a recent mag a guy who covered his toms individually with dry cleaner bags, plastic ones, to keep blight off.
Any suggestions on what i can do to make things go smoothly?
Totty
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I only grow tumbler type toms outside as they give a nice early crop and can be nearly done by the time blight strikes up here. The main tomato crop goes in the greenhouse which gives some protection against blight although, for the last four years we've not had much trouble with it.
I think if you live in a blight-prone area it is probably not a good idea to put too many toms outside unless you are going to spray at the first sign of it and I prefer to garden without chemicals if I can.
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I never grow tomatoes anywhere else but outside, in baskets, pots and in a bed. I've only once ever had a problem with blight, and I'm pretty sure that came in on a plant I bought from a garden centre.
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Not sure whether you grow on a plot or at home, shokkyy, but you're more liable to get blight on a plot where there's lots of other toms & spuds that can play host to it.
Two years ago was a bad year for blight in our area, I took the precautions I recommend in this thread in the FAQ's forum.
http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=56717.msg668473
Out of the 40 or so plot holders on out site, I was the only one not to have blight.
One regular said it was too expensive to spray, (as he tipped his plants into the skip),well 1/4 of a sachet per time out of a box of 10 of the product that costs £8.99 or there abouts, is not expensive in my book, (22.5p a time)when it's protecting 50 tomato plants.
Whether you spray or not is up to you. You pays your money and all that.
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Not sure whether you grow on a plot or at home, shokkyy, but you're more liable to get blight on a plot where there's lots of other toms & spuds that can play host to it.
I grow at home, and I suspect that's why I've always done so well with blight. My house is on a country lane with very few houses nearby and I'm a couple of miles away from the nearest small town with allotments. I'm not sure I'd grow tomatoes if I had to battle blight every year, because I really don't like to use sprays or chemicals.
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Yes, for blight to strike two things have to happen; there have to be airborne blight spores carried to your plants (more likely if there are a lot of potatoes and tomatoes being grown in your area), and then there also has to be a sustained period of high humidity for the spores to germinate on your plants (the Smith period.)
There's not a lot you can do about either of those but if you don't want to go down the spraying route you can try and tip the odds slightly in your favour by making sure you don't unintentionally create a microclimate which favours spore germination.
Don't crowd your plants, and avoid wetting the leaves when watering. I have usually just about got mine through the season in an open-topped cold frame by removing leaves which are touching each other or the sides of the frame (which traps water.) I also managed to save a plant which developed blight by removing the affected stem before it spread to the rest of the plant, but you have to be vigilant and quick (and wash your hands and the knife afterwards!)
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I had blight in 2009 still got plenty of them before it struck tho.
Last yr used Dithane and didnt get any blight. Is it right thats be taken of the market now? Glad i bought a box for this yr.
Hopefully will hear if the new stuff is any good for next yr.
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It's been replaced by the originally named "Bayer Fruit & Vegetable Disease Control". I've still got a stash of Dithane as well!
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There is a lot of work going on to develop blight resistant varieties at the moment. Last year I did Ferline F1 and Legend which both claimed to be blight resistant. I did get a tiny bit of blight but the fruits weren't really affected. There are quite a few other blight resistant varieties around as well. Might be worth having a go with them?
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It's 4 or 5 years back now, but blight managed to totally wipe out my Ferline.
They're blight resistant, not blight proof.
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Ferline is one variety, along with gardeners delight, tumbling tom, tigerella, and a couple of others, we like to grow as organicaly as possible, but we also like tomatoes, therefore if i need a spray which will save a large amount of a favourite crop i will. There are suprisingly few people on site who grow toms and only a couple grow spuds as we are a very small community site (15 plots) with small plots and they take up lots of room. The site is surrounded by fields although im not sure if that bears any relevence to blight or not. Any further advice is much appreciated.
Totty
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I try to be as organic as possible, but with outside toms its a must to spray if i want a decent crop im afraid. And I have tried a year without blight spray something i wont be trying again.
Oh and yes i do also use the more blight resistant varietys.
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Does growing tomatoes organically mean you feed them with something you made yourself?or do you use the tomato feed in the bright red plastic bottles ?I haven`t got a bottle to hand so I don`t know what the magic ingredients are :)
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I use my home made and grown comfrey tea ;)
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blight is always a problem with Toms as they mature late and run into potato harvest.
Last year we didnt had problem with blight (thats once in three years for me) mainly due to wet/very wet august. but we had to live with lots of green tomatoes at the end of the produce.
I dont want to use chemicals and am not taking toms to the plot. they will grow in garden and if they get blighted... well let them *** off :)
on the feeds comfrey/nettle teas are good and last year I had considerable success with nettle teas (beware of the smell)
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As i said before, i am as organic as is feasable for our tastes! has anybody got any suggestions for a suitable spray and were its available from?
Totty
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Spray, against blight?
Bordeaux mixture is an organic spray, the Bayer one is very similar, but both mean spraying as a preventative measure rather than waiting for blight to strike, by then it is too late :( (see link in DDs post )
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When it comes to Bordeaux mix, despite it being classed as organic, there are a lot who have reservations.
Have a look at this blog, you may recognise one of the contributers.
http://blog.gardenersworld.com/2010/04/16/potato-blight-and-bordeaux-mixture/
I only spray when necessary after studying the information I can access. My take on it is given a choice between spraying and having no produce, there's no contest.
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I grow tomatoes in the garden and for the first time last year they got blight.This was the first year that I grew potatoes in containers in the garden.Lesson learnt don't grow the two anywhere near each other.Tomatoes in the garden potatoes down the allotment.
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The implication there is that the potatoes either brought in or attacted the blight. It could have blown in from anywhere.
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Preventing a pest/disease, taking hold of a crop that is expensive to buy in the shops and have far less quality is the aim here! Bordeux mixture it is!
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Think I'd sooner use the Dithane, (or it's replacement), than tip copper all over my toms!
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the new Dithane replacement is copper as well DD, as discussed last year.
http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=58665.msg687647#msg687647
Unless they find something new, it's what we'll all be using when pkts of old style Dithane run out :(
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:ohmy: :ohmy:
I've got a few years stock of the old stuff unless they make it illegal!
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I have been given a packet of "Murphy Traditional Copper Fungicide" is this the same sort of thing that you speak of. On the packet it states that you need to spray at the first sign of blight. What do you use to stop it before it starts?
Totty
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It's all in the earlier links and posts.
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Yes, growing under cover guards against blight. I've seen a few people rig up plastic roofs over their tomato rows (remember the scene in the Godfather when Vito dies among the tomatoes? plastic sheets all over the tops :) ) but I don't think I could rig anything that would withstand the winds on my plot.
I opt to grow in pots near the house (semi-sheltered?) and subscribe to blightwatch (it's free) who send me an alert whenever conditions are right for blight. When I get an alert I spray with 50/50 milk/water, which seems to slow infection but never stops it completely...