[JayG]

Sorry to hear it's struck again Mum. 

I'm fighting what is now a rearguard action to keep my 2 cold frame Red Alert plants alive long enough to get the remaining tomatoes (most of them - estimate about 10-12 lbs) big enough to stand a chance of ripening them indoors.

The problem is blight, and the pruning is having to be more and more intensive as it starts to appear on new stems - it's beginning to remind me of the Black Knight in Monty Python (just a flesh wound!!)   

The greenhouse toms still look healthy enough - I've still only had a few ripe ones off the Sungold and Sweet Million, but loads more set but unripe trusses on both of them, whereas the Inca plums are mostly a decent size and plenty of them, but none of them anywhere near ripe yet.

Decent weather forecast this week for the most part - think it needs to be!

[shokkyy]

I lost all my outside bush tomatoes to blight a few weeks back - and I usually never get blight here, because I'm a very long way from the nearest veggies being grown. My ever reliable Gartenperle in baskets have limped along but looked half dead all year, and I'm not going to get anything worthwhile from them. The only healthy survivors are the Alicante and San Marzano plants in my tunnel, which are growing like triffids.

Alicante is a pretty old variety which not many people seem to bother growing any more, but I've been doing a few plants of it for the last few years and it's a very good tomato. This year and last have been very bad conditions but both years they've given me an enormous crop of huge tomatoes. And they're fine for eating or cooking, good all rounder. It just seems a pretty tough variety, because I've grown it inside and outside and it just seems to cope with everything.

[Kirpi]

I am planning to try six tomato plants out on the allotment next year for the first time.

Do I need to net the plants against birds or insect pests?

I am thinking of putting the plants in the same bed as the potatoes as they are the same family - is this a good move?

Finally, in a raised bed I am thinking of a spacing of about 2 feet each way and I guess they will need staking?

[JayG]

They could be attacked by slugs when small, but should be OK when larger as long as you don't have any sparrows with particularly bad flower-pecking habits.

Not a good idea to put them next to spuds - being from the same family they are both susceptible to blight and whichever gets it first will readily pass it on to the other! 

Cordon types will need a long cane to tie them to, bush types usually need a bit of help because they have many stems which can break off, but a few short canes and plenty of strategically-placed twine should do the trick (they only grow to about 3' high.)

[DD.]

Have a look at this, it's how I support my outdoor tomatoes:

http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=79144.msg890141#msg890141

[Kirpi]

Thanks DD - the same as I do for my climbing beans.

JayG - thanks for that. We don't get sparrows so much but we do get jackdaws which tend to sit on any horizontal support and peck at peas and stuff so DD's frame looks about right.

I see what you mean about one crop passing blight onto the other and I did think about that but I also know you are supposed to rotate potatoes so thought it best to keep the Solanacae family together. 

What if I keep two years between tomatoes and potatoes in a six year rotation? I could put tomatoes with my miscellaneous bed then.

[JayG]

What if I keep two years between tomatoes and potatoes in a six year rotation? I could put tomatoes with my miscellaneous bed then.

Not trying to be awkward, but having said that spuds and toms can both get blight because they are from the same family, other diseases and pests they can potentially suffer from are different, some build up in the soil (like potato eelworm) and some don't (including blight, although it can overwinter in "volunteer" potatoes.)

Any sort of rotation is better than none - blight varies naturally a lot from year to year, this year of course being especially bad, but growing the two as far apart as possible from each other (and other people's crops) is a sensible precaution if at all possible.

[Kirpi]

Thanks JayG. I've read that potato eelworm attacks tomatoes as well so I will need to keep a good space between them in my rotation.

[JaneS]

Reading through these posts has at least made me feel a little better and realise its not just me.  Had 24 tomato plants in my polytunnel and have had no more than a handful of marble sized green toms, just the occasional red one, very disappointing, especially with the cost of growbags and time and effort.  Had about 5 cucumbers from 9 cucumber plants with another 3-5 still growing.  My first experience of polytunnels so a steep learning curve. Gave up with the toms today and pulled them all up, just 3 cucumber plants remaining.