ISO: ISO gardening help for my tomato plant: what's wrong with it????

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marilynfl

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Can you see the texture on the lower leaves? This just started happening and I don't know what it means. Also I found one big tomato with a black hole drilled in the side. That sounds bad, huh...

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g166/Finer_Kitchens/Marilyns%20Minutia/004.jpg

New shot of our salad table. I've already made a batch of CathyZ's blender pesto:

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g166/Finer_Kitchens/Marilyns%20Minutia/001.jpg

Left to Right: Lettuce >> thyme, basil, parsley >> rocket lettuce and baby round carrots.

 
Pretty garden, my main problem with tomatoes alway is those ugly huge caterpillars.

Did have a peach tree that got a curly leaf disease. Where's Joe? Maybe he will know.

 
B.t. spray (Bacillus thurengensis, but you only need to know the initials.) works wonders...

on all caterpillars, and it is totally organic. Look for spray bottles of "Organic Caterpillar Killer" and check the ingredient. No more tomato worms!

 
Could be that or another virus. Is this a new bed or did you plant tomatoes there last year?

Tomatoes need to be planted where no members of the nightshade family grew the previous year--tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, potatoes. They all carry the tomato viruses.

Keeping them together and planting in a new place every year really helps. You can also alternate two places but a three or four-year rotation works best. You should also keep nightshade plants out of compost, if you compost, if it is intended to go back into the vegetable garden.

In the meantime, pulling off those lower leaves and watering the soil instead of the foliage will help.

Eventually every tomato plant dies of a virus; the strategy is to stave it off and get a crop out of it first.

 
Yes, it can even be sprayed on food in transit. It is simply a bacteria that affects caterpillars...

it won't do a thing to you and me, or to beneficial insects that aren't in the caterpillar stage. All you need do is wash the produce as usual--the spray has a syrupy base that is not tasty.

 
I think Melissa nailed it with the mosaic virus. Bummer. Joe, we don't plant

in the ground. I heard too many horror stories about that. But I do think Larry used the same pot as last year's tomato plant. This is a different variety (a patio plant) and it's given us more tomatoes than any...ever.

Wiki doesn't sound very hopeful...no cure for viruses. I just hope the green tomatoes will ripen before this goes.

 
New soil next year should do the trick. Something else can be grown in the old soil

just not tomaoes, peppers, eggplant or potatoes.

Your green tomatoes should still ripen, and if you got lots of tomatoes off this plant you beat the odds.

 
I agree, it looks like a virus or fungus. Yes, nice-looking herbs. You have

an early start in Florida, although it was a warm spring here! I'm growing parsley and basil too, but they don't look nearly as good as yours do yet ;o)

 
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