Tomato plants wilting / tomatoes turning white? UPDATED 6/15

[jemagsy]

We have all our tomatos planted in containers with clay and garden soil mixed together. Our plants really thrived the first part of this year and two weeks ago our first tomatoes starting appearing. Everything was going along well, and the tomatoes were getting bigger however things have definately took a down hill turn this week.

It has been in the mid to high 90s (Fareinheit) all week, very very high humidity. However my garden needs to be watered twice per day or the soil drys out, so we've been watering the tomato plants that way too.

We planted the tomatoes in two and a half gallon buckets 80% deep like the instructions said. (We got them as really small plants). The soil is only about half way up in the buckets and holes ARE drilled in the bottom of the buckets to allow drainage.

Now though all the plants are wilted (this has just started occuring in the last two days) and on two of the plants the tomatoes have started turning white (they were still green - no red tomatoes yet).

What is going on and how do we turn things back in our and our gardens favor?

 

[rockytopsis]

Just wondering if it could be the heat, maybe provide some shade during the heat of the day? Just guessing here though.

 

[OaklandCityFarmer]

It's probably sunburn. This usually happens when the plant is overstressed or has a rapid change in growing conditions. Especially with container gardening, plants can dry out very quickly. Tomatoes do not like inconsistent watering or lack of water and, unfortunately, your fruit will pay the price. Put some shallow trays underneath the pots to keep a water reservoir so they don't dry out.

If you're watering twice per day and you have clay soils, I believe you may not be watering deep enough. I would highly recommend deep watering and mulching very heavily to get your garden back on track. We mulch with a layer of compost, newspaper then shredded redwood and this seems to work just right.

Good luck

 

[patandchickens]

I agree, the primary problem is clearly that they are getting too hot and drying out too much. If it were me I would do ALL of the following:

--put more soil in the buckets, til there was only about 2" freeboard at the top. You may need to pull off lower leaves to do this. Tomatoes and other solenaceous things are some of the very very few plants it's ok to 'hill up' this way -- they will grow extra roots along the buried stem. The main reason to do it, here, is to have extra soil functioning as more water-reservoir and thermal mass.

--cobble together some insulating shelter around the buckets, even just a knocked-together wooden frame (and then heavily mulch over the entire thing with hay, including between the buckets, so that you can no longer see that the 'maters are even planted in buckets).

--rig up an automatic watering system, of the capillary- or gravity-feed type, so they can sip water as needed during the day.

You might also consider putting them somewhere they get afternoon shade.

As for the set fruits turning white -- are you sure they're not just starting to ripen? Tomatoes DO generally go thru a whitish phase before they turn yellow and then orange and then red. Just a thought

GOod luck,

Pat, who had her first tomato flower of the year today

 

[jemagsy]

Okay have taken some of the suggestions.

1) Put more dirt in and filled up until about 2 inches away from top or (if the plant did not reach up above the bucket top like 2 of my 12) only 20% of plant exposed.

2) Mulched the rest of the way of the bucket.

3) Put them at the edge of a couple trees so that they will get some shade during the day.

I will be building the wooden frame and such later, but have to find some more wood scraps or wait until later, when the budget has a bit more room. (We had to have new tires this month or my husband couldn't continue making the 70 mile/day commute for very much longer).

The white fruits upon closer inspection did not look healthy, they were shriveled, partially white, and I think just rotten.

I did notice two new things, however, the leaves on some branches were turning brown and on two of the plants there were little warts? for lack of a better term at the bottom of the stem, really close to the ground. The wart spots were within two inches of the dirt and didn't look unhealthy per se but I had never noticed them before. Is it possible this is where the plant is trying to grow new roots? (I did have one plant that was a bit bent and did grow new roots along the stem where the stem hit the ground) Or do these plants have a disease of some sort?

The only things I found on the internet are that they are either a root initial or, from one article in a NY Times issue in 1921, detailing how potato warts can cross over or be carried by tomatoes planted in the same soil and that the warts were infecting garden soils in MD, PA, and WV in the preceding years. I live in GA, its been eighty-seven years since this story, and we got the soil from up underneath an old dead tree stump (the tree was several decades old) when we cleared the stump and bank out. The soil is red clay mixed with potting soil. I just amended the soil with a bag of Jungle Growth vegetable & flower this week.

Thanks for your help.

 

[Grow 4 Food]

sounds to me like you might need a little bit of lime too. Are they rotting from the bottom up?

 

[jemagsy]

I honestly do not know if they are rotting... I was wondering that myself. My grandma said to throw some epsom salts in the buckets with them.

I may perhaps try that.

As for the lime, most of the soil is potting soil or garden soil so should I really need to add anything else?

 

[OaklandCityFarmer]

The white fruits upon closer inspection did not look healthy, they were shriveled, partially white, and I think just rotten.

So, I think the problem may be Spotted Wilt. This does tend to make the fruit look like what you are describing. The disease is carried by thrips and really can only be taken care of by removing the infected plants and replacing them.

The only thing I can think of that may look "wart" like is timber rot in tomatoes but this usually very uncommon, IME.

The browning of the stems and leaves may be blight.

 

[jemagsy]

Do these pictures help? I was not quite sure how to describe it. They bushed out a very tiny bit but I trimmed back some when I poured in more dirt. I also took off all the rotten tomatoes and disposed of them (not in the compost). Again, not all of the plants are unhealthy, but about one third of them have the wilted/brown leaves.

An example of stunted growth we are seeing them on two of the twelve plants. The one on the left is about normal sized for our group, the one to the right is a bit more stunted. I do not unfortunately have pictures of the warts I saw at the bottom of the plant.

(Sorry for having posted all this in the fruit/veggie forum, I just noticed the is a pest forum! oops suppose this should have gone there - if someone wants to move please feel free. I'll try and pay more attention next time).

 

[OaklandCityFarmer]

Looks like early blight to me which can cause fruit rot. This will also stunt growth and make your plants look the way they do.

My best guess as to what happened. Since the tomatoes were planted half way in the buckets the leaves were very close to the dirt, the walls of the bucket caused splashing of water and dirt (where spores that cause early blight live) and since the buckets prevented adequate airflow this cause your problem

Copper sprays can be effective when dealing with early blight. I would highly recommend keeping water off of the leaves. I would give them a feeding of nitrogen (compost or other method), crushed eggshells (2 per plant), spray with copper and hope for the best. Oh, and I'd stake them just to give them more of a support.

Good luck!