blossom end rot and blight

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PLANTS555 Waynesville, NC(Zone 7a) Apr 05, 2008

how do I keep my tomatoes from getting blossom end rot and blight without having to use chemicals

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tarheel2az Tonto Basin, AZ Apr 05, 2008

Since working out how to keep soil moisture relatively consistent, problems with BER have stopped. With the dry climate here one has just about complete control of soil moisture by watering effectively. With the NC rain, it's a little trickier.

Searching the tomato forum for "blossom end rot" or "BER" will yield lots of info. As I understand it, real wet, real dry, and big moisture fluctuations mess up the plant's ability to distribute certain elements (calcium, for instance) to the developing fruit and leads to the BER. If your soil is seriously calcium deficient or its ph is way off neutral (can only tell by soil analysis) soil amendments would probably be called for.

If I were back in NC, I'd be putting in a raised bed and supplementing the soil with a good deal oforganic material in an attempt to mitigate the BER & I'd get a soil analysis to find out what I was working with.

Sure beautiful country where you are.

Frank

This message was edited Apr 5, 2008 4:43 PM

Post #4762953
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Farmerdill Augusta, GA(Zone 8a) Apr 06, 2008

Blossom end rot is much worse with some cultivars, particularly paste types. It is also associated with stress. In most cases plants stressed early in cold soil will outgrow it as the weather warms.

Blight is a different story, it is often used as a catch all for several different diseases. Most of which have few remedies. Foliar diseases can be controlled somewhat with a fungicide (everything is a chemical but there are some approved for organic folks). Most of our diseases here are soil diseases. Some cultivars are more resistant than others.
http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/tomatoproblemsolver/index.html

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