Allotment Gardening Advice Help Chat
Growing => Grow Your Own => Topic started by: jd67stella on August 29, 2011, 10:12
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can somebody please tell me where ime going wrong, for the last 2 years ive had tomato blight and it ruined my lovely toms. i bought a blight mixture and swore it wont happen again, but it did. i sprayed them at first sighns but to no avail. i have a 12/8 plastic greenhouse to which i planted toms on both sides, on the right i have 12 plants in buckets which ive had loads off, and on the left planted about 45 plants into the ground, now i only done this because monty don off gardeners world said that you can plant so close together, only if they are fed reguarly, to wich i did, the plants grew enormous but they all ended up with blight and were ruined. now the old timers up the allotments where my greenhouse is reckon that the plants were to close together but i did exactly what monty did, so can anyone please answer my guestion to whoes right and wrong, and where did i go wrong, AGAIN. many thanks.
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The sprays are a prevention, not a cure. You have to act before the plants are affected.
See this from the FAQ section:
http://chat.allotment-garden.org/index.php?topic=56717.0
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Spraying apart, blight is all a bit of a game of chance (including of course whether blight spores are actually present or not) and plants grown indoors should be less at risk than those grown outdoors, but I think it is also true that the high local levels of humidity created by dense planting are perfect for spore germination and can potentially tip the balance in the wrong direction.
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did you really get blight?
A lot of people have Botrytis (grey mould) on their greenhouse tomatoes this year, me included :(
It strikes when you keep the greenhouse too closed/unventilated, because it is cool outside, and the humidity level rises.
I really cant see how you could possibly grow 45 plants down one side of a 12ft long greenhouse :ohmy: This is asking for Botrytis ...or was the quantity a typo :unsure:
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[hi beleive me, i know what blight looks like, cause all the guys up the allotment society are all fosills and they know what there on about, it wasnt grey and botrytis, it was blight, and there was 45 plants in there as monty don told millions of veiwers how to plant them, ie, close together as long as they are fed reguarly, wich i did, and the door was open for weeks on end and it still apeared. so i hope you understand me now. the next step is to email the bbc and ask them what happened but thanks for youre replies.
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You get blight by spores being blown in on the wind. Growing in a greenhouse reduces but does not prevent the disease. Closeness of spacing is likely to mean the disease, once it arrives, may spread more quickly - but it will not cause it to arrive in the first place. We have had ideal blight conditions in many places round the country this summer so I don't think the GW advice can necessarily carry any blame.
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I find it hard to believe, as already mentioned, that he would say you could put 4 in per foot of space.
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Unless they're 'Tom Tiddler' fashion, one back, one forward etc DD.
We always do 12 in the greenhouae that way, over an 6' length
Have done so for years, but in effect, it is a double row we're doing, and the ones away from the glass seem to do exactly the same as the ones in the front.
They're in pots and water trays though - not in border soil.
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Sadly, we managed to get blight on our tomatoes in the mini tunnel... spores must have blown in the ventilators, as the door was closed. :tongue2:
We had our plants far too close together for them to really grow well, depsite good fed and watering, so it is back to fewer further apart again for me next year.
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Unless they're 'Tom Tiddler' fashion, one back, one forward etc DD.
We always do 12 in the greenhouae that way, over an 6' length
Have done so for years, but in effect, it is a double row we're doing, and the ones away from the glass seem to do exactly the same as the ones in the front.
They're in pots and water trays though - not in border soil.
The OP's got nearly twice as many, though - that's really crowded.
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Sadly, we managed to get blight on our tomatoes in the mini tunnel... spores must have blown in the ventilators, as the door was closed. :tongue2:
It's the eternal quandary when the weather is humid, leave the windows and doors closed to miss blight.................and you get Botrytis ::)
Leave them open for ventilation to avoid Botrytis and you get blight ::)
Scuppered whatever you do ...double :(
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Trust to luck ;)
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And when the blight strikes I suppose you don't put the plants or tomatoes on the compost heap! I say this because I caught my wife throwing a few on the compost. Better in the dustbin I suppose!
Anton
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oh yes, dont compost it, burn it.
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Thanks for the advice, Stella.
Anton
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Unless they're 'Tom Tiddler' fashion, one back, one forward etc DD.
We always do 12 in the greenhouae that way, over an 6' length
Have done so for years, but in effect, it is a double row we're doing, and the ones away from the glass seem to do exactly the same as the ones in the front.
They're in pots and water trays though - not in border soil.
The OP's got nearly twice as many, though - that's really crowded.
Probably agree there DD.
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I too followed Monty's advice to squeeze lots of plants into a small area (about 20 plants up one side of a 8' x 6' greenhouse direct into the soil). All my plants now have blight, but I have a great crop of green tom's so lots of green tom' chutney to make ::)
In my laziness I didn't sterilize the greenhouse at the begining of the season that I had just purchased secondhand.
I will be growing my tom's the same again next year as the plants were strong and the yield was high.
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Sterilising the greenhouse would not have had en effect on whether you got blight or not as it's wind-born.
Cramming them in like that is asking for botrytis though, in my opinion, which is often mistaken for blight and is made worse by poor air circulation around plants.
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Agree with DD, and/but if you are unlucky enough to have blight spores blowing into your greenhouse the condensation and humidity resulting from overcrowding would provide perfect germination conditions for them too! :(
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That's two of us then who can't understand M.D.'s take on cramming them in!
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make that 3...the toms in my g/house got Botrytis, badly, without cramming them in.
So if he did say to do that...... :ohmy:
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Sterilising the greenhouse would not have had en effect on whether you got blight or not as it's wind-born.
Cramming them in like that is asking for botrytis though, in my opinion, which is often mistaken for blight and is made worse by poor air circulation around plants.
I'm very sure it's blight as the leaves, stem and fruit are all affected. Also, the infected areas do no look or appear to furry or fuzzy.
Reading the posts in this thread I think I'll give them more room next year.