How Not To Grow Tomatoes

My tomatoes did horribly this year. I know why, so I thought I'd share!

For one thing, I planted them far too late into the season, due to a variety of factors including a late start on the seedlings and a late start getting the raised beds done, coupled with the fear of starting them too early. As it was, they wound up 2-3 weeks too late into the season, or about the end of June. They should really have been in ground by the beginning of June, covered with a light row cover if necessary to prevent frost damage.

Due to what I suspect is way too much nitrogen in the soil (heavy compost load in the soil), the plants got GINORMOUS, and as a result they crowded against one another, broke their tomato cages and in some cases literally snapped the stakes in half, and fell over. I planted them quite far apart, and in fact my husband teased me about how much room I left between them. Or he did, until they started to get big. But the upshot is, they got too big and both undid themselves with their own weight and crowded out all possibility of light and air getting to the inner parts of the plants. No ventilation = bad juju.

And then there was the overhead watering. Due to the speed with which we had to get the plants in the soil this year, we ended up not being able to install the drip irrigation system we normally use. Instead, we installed a "spic spic spic whirrrrr" type sprayer at the center of the garden and let it water everything. Overhead watering is NOT usually a good thing for gardens, and it really proved true this year. I wound up with foliar problems I've not faced in the past, and between that and the lack of ventilation under the tomatoes, they stayed rather damp.

And finally, when the tomatoes were finally setting on and just thinking about ripening, we had a couple of weeks of cool, dampish weather and rain. Boom, late blight. Now from my research I've been doing, it looks like late blight is not common in our area and is usually found in the Northeast, but I'm almost entirely certain that's what's wrong with the tomatoes. They got yellowed and spotty on the leaves, and the tomatoes themselves developed brown leathery areas near the top of the stems. We ended up with only a few pounds of ripe, edible tomatoes from 42+ plants, and a few pounds more of edible green tomatoes. Rather ridiculous.

On the up side, it turns out that late blight doesn't typically overwinter in the soil, so if I pull all the plants out and get rid of the blighted plants in the garbage, it shouldn't recur next year. I will be sure to plant the tomatoes in another part of the vegetable bed as well, just in case. Though the spores are wind-blown and would travel easily to another part of the garden, the largest concentration should be in the soil at the base of the currently affected plants, so by moving to another bed I should hopefully avoid the worst potential for contamination.

To Sum Up...

* Plant tomatoes with LOTS of space between them, to insure adequate air flow and ventilation.
* Plant early enough to leave them time to ripen in the heat of the summer sun, so they're not trying to ripen in the cool, wet fall weather. This may mean using Wall O Water or some row covers to lengthen your growing season in spring.
* Nix the overhead watering. Drip systems win.
* Don't overdo the nitrogen fertilizer, or the nitrogen-rich compost.
* Pull up and destroy blighted plants as soon as blight appears. Do not compost blighted plants. Blight can cross to potatoes, eggplants, solanacious weeds (like nightshade) and petunias, so watch those plants as well.
* Don't plant tomatoes in the same spot where diseased or pest-laden tomatoes, potatoes, or eggplants grew the previous year.