What is this on my tomato leaves?

[Fiishergurl]

It is spreading like crazy. Started on one plant only we didn't know it was something serious so we just removed the leaves (1 here, 1 there) for the last few weeks. Then a rainy night and a couple of days later about 30 leaves on one plant had it and a few leaves on a couple of other plants. They are grown in homemade containers with miracle grow potting mix, 1 cup of lime and a 2 cup fertilizer strip of 10-10-10. They've been in the container since about Feb 1st (zone 9b) in central florida. Just a week ago we started supplementing with 2 tblspns of Texas Tomato Food about every third fill up since we have a 2 gallon reservoir. The plants were looking amazing (still look good at first glance) and then the leaves started getting this stuff. We sprayed yesterday (when we noticed it) with Serenade and removed all of the affected leaves we could find. The plant that has it the worst has also been dropping blossoms and some have been rotting. It does have about 5 little tomatoes on it but has probably dropped 20 buds or more over the last couple of weeks. Some just drop and some rot. I thought maybe that was because some blooms were on the plant when the weather was still below 50 at night during some nights in February and a few in March.






Here's some pictures of the plants just so you can see the overall status of them. They still look healthy until you look closely. Every time I go look at them I find more infected leaves that I didn't see before so I don't know if it's just spreading that fast or I missed them. I remove infected leaves, bag them, and immediately wash my hands and scissors before going back again. The pictures below were taken before I removed all the bad leaves and you might be able to see them in the pics.








Forgot to mention we are at an RV Park on the Intracoastal Waterway in Central Florida. The plants are grouped together in these pictures because the wind was 15-20mph with gusts up to 30 so we had them behind a partial wind break. But they are always in close proximity to each other and only 20 feet away from the salt water.

Any suggestions, advice, etc would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!
Ginny

[RayR]

Definitely looks fungal. Has the temperatures been warm there, 65°F or better? I'm thinking Botrytis (Gray Mold)

[nnjjohn]

looks like early blight.. I am no pro but, if I were to see anything close to that on my plants this coming season.. I will have a gallon pump application sprayer and mist everything with one part bleach and water. additionally, I want to ask what kind of tomato plants are they? Are they hybrids (disease resistant) are they determinants.

[kurt]

Try a magnifying glass to see if those white spots are moving.Looks like some kind of critter,mites,aphids.Seems like they are congregating on the veins.

[kath]

I'm not familiar with the diseases you might get in the South, but it looks like the grey mold that tends to favor the dark tomato varieties in my garden. I live in a really humid spot near a large river.

kath

[Fiishergurl]

Thanks everyone for the reply. A fellow Floridian that has lots of experience with growing in similar environment thought it was grey mold too. The spots are not moving. I mixed an 1/8 cup of bleach in a 32 ounce spray bottle and misted all the tomato plants. The plant that has been affected the most is an heirloom. A hybrid plant nearby has a few leaves that finally showed the mold, but it wasn't affected nearly as much. Temps have been in the 70's and even 80's during most days and the 50's and 60's at night. It started on one plant first (hindsight is 20/20) but I didn't realize what is was and it was just a leaf here or there or a blossom that rotted instead of turning into a tomato so I just pinched those off. It is very very very humid here and rains a lot. Once I found out about the bleach spray I wanted to get it on as soon as possible because more rain is coming tonight. We are in an RV Park and the tomato plants looked beautiful (and still do except for the butchering I did on the one plant to remove all the affected leaves) but the winds here are terrible. We are right on the water. Next week we are moving to another spot and will have a place to put the plants that is away from the water and out of the winds.

Thank you again for the replies and so quickly. I will keep you posted as to what happens. From what I read (I googled grey mold and the bleach remedy) I'm expecting the infected leaves to die off from the bleach spray and hoping that the rest of the parts of the plants will recover. Fingers crossed. This is my first year growing anything in 15 years due to hectic work schedule.

Ginny

[ginger2778]

Copper fungicide applied every 4 days for 3 times works very well for me. Be super thorough, even douse the stems as well as the upper and undersides of the leaves. I had that this year too, got it conquered. Coincidentally, it happened within a few days of adding a new fertilizer, and I looked at my blackening leaves under 10 times magnification, but really didn't see any spores, just blackening leaves from the outer edges inward. The copper spray did the trick though.

Marsha

[kath]

Best of luck with the rest of your growing season, Ginny- hope the bleach will solve the problem. Picking off bad leaves and spraying with fungicide, etc. usually helps me stay ahead of it and get fruits from the plant despite the infection.

kath

[Fiishergurl]

Thanks Kath. I ordered Serenade and have had it on hand for a few weeks but I didnt start spraying with it because I thought it was too early. I guess its never too early in hot humid rainy windy weather.

Ginny

[Fiishergurl]

Marsha,

What did the new fertilizer do to make that happen and what does the copper do? Havent researched that yet. So much to learn.

Ginny

[Cole_Robbie]

Copper is a fungicide. I think it's actually organic, because it is a simple element. Sulphur works too.

I would try hydrogen peroxide at about 1%. Some people have also reported success against powdery mildew by spraying a milk and water mixture. I think it's 10% milk.

Daconil is the chemical route. It is the most commonly used fungicide. From what I read, it is sprayed on many commercial crops as a preventative.

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by Cole_Robbie

Copper is a fungicide. I think it's actually organic, because it is a simple element. Sulphur works too.

I would try hydrogen peroxide at about 1%. Some people have also reported success against powdery mildew by spraying a milk and water mixture. I think it's 10% milk.

Daconil is the chemical route. It is the most commonly used fungicide. From what I read, it is sprayed on many commercial crops as a preventative.

In my garden conditions, I have tried both, and the copper spray worked better. The dark and crispy thing happened a day or 2 after I used a tomato formula powdered fert in my earthboxes, so I wonder if I put too much in and gave them fertilizer burn, rather than having grey mold. The reason I wonder that is because I couldn't see any fungal colony or spores under 10 power magnification. It did rain right around that time too, so I used the copper spray, because it looked like grey mold on eyeball viewing. So I thought, if its going to die anyway, I might as well try the spray. I also flooded the earthboxes to dilute the fertilizer.
I don't know which, but one of the 2 worked!
Marsha

[ginger2778]

I just expanded your picture again, and I think I do see spores, or at least white granules. Could it be salt? Lots of em. Better hit them with fungicide. I like copper spray because it also works on some bacteria too. It is considered organic too. Word of caution, I now use mine at half the strength of the minimum dosage, because evan at normal minimum strength, my plants had stunted leaves from it, but at half as strong, it works really well without the leaf distortion. It took my plants about 3 weeks to outgrow the stunted leaves, so I learned the hard way. Also, you may already know this but only spray early morning or late evening so as not to burn the sprayed leaves in the sun.
Marsha

[RayR]

Originally Posted by ginger2778

I just expanded your picture again, and I think I do see spores, or at least white granules. Could it be salt? Lots of em. Better hit them with fungicide. I like copper spray because it also works on some bacteria too. It is considered organic too. Word of caution, I now use mine at half the strength of the minimum dosage, because evan at normal minimum strength, my plants had stunted leaves from it, but at half as strong, it works really well without the leaf distortion. It took my plants about 3 weeks to outgrow the stunted leaves, so I learned the hard way. Also, you may already know this but only spray early morning or late evening so as not to burn the sprayed leaves in the sun.
Marsha

Marsha, what copper fungicide did you use? Some copper compounds are more harsh than others.

[Fiishergurl]

Marsha,

To the naked eye you cannot see those spores individually but I noticed them in the picture also. I guess it could be salt but I dont think so as I have a picture of two tiny tomatoes from this plant that I took about a month ago. One tomato had those tiny white specks all around it and the other didnt. The one with the specks also had a dark spot on the end and it ended up rotting off. I will post the pictures. I wondered at the time what those spots were. The tomatoes were smaller than a pencil eraser at the the time.

Ginny