Tomato leaves curling - A Gardeners Forum [Archive]

My tomato plants were doing GREAT, but within the past few days the leaves have begun to curl inward - what is this? They are a beautiful healthy green, no signs of insects, plants are still growing

Welcome Julie!

Quoted from Carolyn Male:

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Basically Leaf Roll is a physiological problem while most causes of leaf curl are environmental.

I think I went over the leaf curl stuff in that same post but here it is again.

Leaves curl when it's too hot, too cool, too dry, too wet, too windy, or when the plant has a heavy fruit burden and most hybrids have leaves that curl normally.

If leaves curl over into a tube like structure, check for aphids.

So as I said above, I ignore leaf curl unless there are other symtoms.

Leaf curl can occur at any time while physiological Leaf Roll usually occurs early in the season when the plants are still immature, as I said previously.

Thanks, I'll relax a bit. We have had an extremly wet two weeks here on the Peninsula and I fear Blight. I'm growing plants in very large pots as I have done for the past four years - new soil each year. Good drainage. To prevent any possibility of Blight in advance, what can I do?

Julie, blight is mostly an airborne disease so fresh potting mix, clean containers and mulch will only go so far to help. The other thing you could do is start a preventative spraying regimen with a daconil based spray like Ortho's Garden disease control every 7-10 days. This will go a long way in preventing the most common fungal diseases.

Thanks John!

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Originally posted by patches1414:

Should I cut off those lower branches?

Patti, I'm not sure I follow. The lower branches' leaves are curling? Curled leaves should just be a temporary problem if there are no other symptoms, but lower branches can always be pruned off if you prefer.

Thanks Julie for starting this post.

I'm going to assume that the same is true for curled pepper leaves. Plants are healthy and buds are forming, just the leaves curling under.

My greenhouse is 90 degrees most days, I'm trying to cool it a bit by getting everything wet. I have quite a few plants in the greenhouse and they are thriving otherwise.

Do you have any fans or anything for air circulation? That might help. I'v never grown in a greenhouse but know air circulation is important. JD

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Originally posted by johnCT:

If leaves curl over into a tube like structure, check for aphids.

So as I said above, I ignore leaf curl unless there are other symtoms.

Leaf curl can occur at any time while physiological Leaf Roll usually occurs early in the season when the plants are still immature, as I said previously.

No aphids that i can see on mine. heres what i did though. . i was having all those sappers as you guys call them . . and i posted a few pics. i GRADUALLY cut them down. . not all at once, but every couple days i'd take 2 bigger ones and kept the small ones gone for good. After doing this though, i have one plant, that i took almost 1/3 of the plant away by just sappers alone. . has leaf curl almost the whole plant

The leaves arent brown. . nothing looks dead, but it was RIGHT after doing this. Think i may have shocked the plant? No other plant responded like this. . they are all looking fantastic!

I have a large fan going in my greenhouse at all times.

My plants are healthy, and I see no signs of little bugs, but I will keep watch.