A Gardeners Forum Forums Gardening Reference Gardening in 2006 I"m a murderer!!!

Look at what i did!!!

Actually dunno if its something i did. these plants were broken in fine. . . sat a week outdoors in full sun at the end without wilting.

This lil guy lasted 3 days approx. till this whole branch wilted. Notice the spots (if you can its a lil far picture).



This dude as well is the same spots. . but nothing wilted at all yet. .



And while i'm posting XXX pictures of plants. . heres this zuchini squash plant that has a very powdery white color to its leaf. I dunno if its Powdery Mildew, cuz it doesnt flake off or rub off. the whole leaf turned a faint white/green color the very next day after transplanting outdoors. Its buddy (same zuchini plant) next to it is doing just fine.



i WILL be taking a soil sample tommorow and post the resulting ph. this was green as all geddup grass soil, very well maintained & fertilized. (if anything too acidic as i NEVER put down lime)

Lemme know your thoughts &/or suggestions. . . PH test comming 5-30

btw i dunno if its at all pertinant. . . but this bark mulch is BRAND NEW cedar mulch (no colors added) that i put down 2 days after planting these.

Bookem-Danno
????
Hope it turns out well,btw,I have a ph prob 2.
pleaae post what you find out, as will I.
Good day 2 you
Angie

Could be Early Blight and Septoria Leaf Spot.

Both of those kinds of "fungi" overwinter in all sorts of plant debris, on the seeds it's self, or on weeds around the garden.
Spores of those fungi can splashed or blown to tomato leaves, by rain water, hose watering or winds even. And can be right in the soil of your garden already..
Or even come from the nursery you bought the plant.
And this disease can develope by the warmer temp's, extra rainfall and high humidity.

I'd also pull that mulch right away from the base of that plant, up to a few inches even on either side of it..
When mulch is right up to a plants stem, it can cause all sorts of problems..

As an add on question to what weezie just said... is it a bad idea for mulch to be right around the plants in general?

I have mulch all around my plants and wondered if it was a good idea.

Thanks

And Danno... I know how you feel about being a murderer. My watermelon plants looked just like that before they completely died I hope your don't have the same fate!!!!

Marina-

Honestly, I see all kinds of stuff when I first put plants out. I do get early blight on tomatoes frequently, but as the plant grows, in most years it will outpace the blight, and you can snip off the blighted leaves once the plant is a little bigger. I'd give 'em all a week and post some more pics...

my first thought is that the mulch is the problem.

i don't usually put mulch around the vegy's. around the flowers and other plants yes.

if you do feel you need to mulch around the vegy's grass clippings are a really good mulch - especially for tomatoes. and you can add on to it as the summer goes on...you'll always have a fresh supply of material

Mulch is a good thing for plants,
*it keeps moisture in the soil at the drip line for the plants' roots, so they don't dry out...*
just not right up against it's stem..
The stem is very important, it carries its' food up the stem.. leaves can be lost, one by one,
but if that stem has a problem, it's usually a goner.

When you keep the mulch so close, it can keep the plant stem too moist, which in turn can cause several problems, mildew, disease, bugs right onto the stem and make a home..

Most plants, when they come out of the dirt/sprout, they come out at a certain point and that's where they need to be... they know what they need, by then putting a layer of mulch up higher than where they came out, also stresses them...

What I wouldn't give for an old fashion pen and paper to show you a drawing of what I mean..
Hope I explained it ok, it's hard sometimes...

I agree with Dave too, wait a bit, you can snip off leaves if it is..
even with those disease's, which I have the Septoria one, I still get produce from my tomatoes..
Just have to be dilagent to keep the stuff off of the plants and the right growing conditions and you can be alright...

so should i snip off the entire dying limb from this sapling? I mean thats 1/2 the plant already!

And i'll pull the mulch away pronto. i didnt know it would cause such probs!

Least i knwo the right place to come to

First I would just pull back the mulch and let
it breathe for a bit, see if it grows up a bit...

Snip later...

And keep taking pictures for us......

Thanks for the info guys Tommorow I will pull the mulch away. Its not stacked against the stem but definetly all around the bottom of the plant! I never knew, that why this place and all of you are so great!!!!!

I had a close look at the tomatoe and it seems to be in transplant shock. Give a drink of seaweed extract and repeat in a week. She'll be right.

What Weezie is getting at is just pull the mulch back enough that you can see the stem going into the ground, and maybe an extra inch or three. Keeping the ground from drying out around the root zone is the main function of mulch above all else. Also, I try to put a little collar of paper around the stem of small plants. I cut the tubes from paper towel rolls into one inch sections, cut up one side, and slip these around the stem and firm into the soil, so that I have a little barrier around the base. I do this because cutworms will sometimes come along and cut the stem off right at the base. Nothing worse than finding a seedling tomato you've worked hard to grow from seed cut off at the ground. Once the stem thickens a little, there's no more risk of cutworm.

Thanks Dave!!!

They are all too big for the paper, but I did make sure the peper and tomatoe stems could be seen going into the ground. Now I am dying for some of them to ripen!

ok UPDATE!!!!

So far its just the 1 plant that was wilted that died. the other plant that had spots STILL has the spots but has not wilted nor obviously died yet I took a PH sample of the soil and it is about 5.9ish, a lil acidic. . the guy from fruitbasket flowerland told me they should be bout 6.5-7. Suggestions? (worry about it?) all other plants seem to be doing just fine. LOTS of new growth and a very few weird things happening.

I took longy's advice and went out and got some bat guano from east asia. cost me about 4000$ round trip plane ticket with a flyin from a local & a indiana jones escapade trying to leave the country. For real though. . . got some seaweed fertilizer and will put down in a couple days as it rained holy cats & dogs today.

Speaking of the raining of dogs.. . it hailed (yah i know. . end of may and it hailed!) and the hail tore the pi$$ outa some leaves on variouse plants. WHAT TO DO?!?!?!

I'm dreading hail. In Oklahoma, there's a real chance that one good storm could destroy the whole garden. Nothing to do about the shredded leaves.
Soil pH is not as big an issue as some people make it, though it can be important to some crops. Tomatoes like somewhat acid soil, I think they'll be fine. Since your other plants are growing and looking good, that probably means they don't mind the acidity. Not a lot you can do to correct that now anyway. You could sprinkle some dolomite lime around, and till some in this fall as well for next year. DON'T use hydrated lime, it's too harsh on the plants and on soil microbes.

Very interesting. I talked to a stranger about tomato plants this morning when I went to my grand daughters school and she said they had put out bought plants over the weekend and today they are falling over like they were wilting. She said they were fine to start with.

If they're yellow, could be a disease or nematodes. If they're still green, they need to water. I know that sounds like an obvious issue, but I've read other posts where that was all that was wrong.