Cracking fruit

indigosand · April 30, 2013

To what extent can you control this? I grew Carbon last year, and while it was a nice looking plant the chickens ate most of the fruits because they were so deeply cracked. They were in a raised garden bed with excellent drainage. I was thinking of container growing those again this year to see if I could get a better result but was wondering how much influence environmental temperature and humidity has to do with the fruits cracking. Average summer temps here are 90 degrees and approx 11% humidity. We do experience the monsoon type storms at the same time as AZ which as you can imagine did it's damage each time as well. Thoughts?

b54red · April 30, 2013

There is not much you can do to stop ripening fruit from cracking if you get a lot of rain especially after a really dry spell. Carbon is actually better than some of the blacks like Black Krim as far as cracking goes. The only solution is to pick the ripening fruits before the plant gets the heavy rain and let them ripen on a shelf or table on your porch or inside. If you see you are going to get a really heavy rain just get out and pick off all of the fruit that is showing any blushing at all. You still may lose some of the larger greenies to cracking but it beats having a bunch of busted fruit that are no good for anything.

Our humidity for the past 4 days has hovered between 98% and 100% and then today dropped all the way down to 60%. That is why we have so many foliage diseases.

Bill

indigosand · April 30, 2013

Unfortunately it started when the fruits were still not much more than golf ball size and still green.

lycomania · May 2, 2013

I have relatively little experience, but this year I'm using plastic mulch for several reasons, one of which is keeping those torrential waters out of my tomato row.

Don't know yet if it's going to help, but there you go.

indigosand · May 3, 2013

ha! probably not as I'm doing more of a back to eden garden method and it would be hard to keep the seeping from one row to the next from happening but I hope it works for you!

April 30, 2013	#1
indigosand Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Apr 2013 Location: california Posts: 99	Cracking fruit To what extent can you control this? I grew Carbon last year, and while it was a nice looking plant the chickens ate most of the fruits because they were so deeply cracked. They were in a raised garden bed with excellent drainage. I was thinking of container growing those again this year to see if I could get a better result but was wondering how much influence environmental temperature and humidity has to do with the fruits cracking. Average summer temps here are 90 degrees and approx 11% humidity. We do experience the monsoon type storms at the same time as AZ which as you can imagine did it's damage each time as well. Thoughts? __________________ Elizabeth

April 30, 2013	#3
indigosand Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Apr 2013 Location: california Posts: 99	Unfortunately it started when the fruits were still not much more than golf ball size and still green. __________________ Elizabeth

May 3, 2013	#5
indigosand Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Apr 2013 Location: california Posts: 99	ha! probably not as I'm doing more of a back to eden garden method and it would be hard to keep the seeping from one row to the next from happening but I hope it works for you! __________________ Elizabeth

April 30, 2013	#2
b54red Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Sep 2009 Location: Alabama Posts: 7,068	There is not much you can do to stop ripening fruit from cracking if you get a lot of rain especially after a really dry spell. Carbon is actually better than some of the blacks like Black Krim as far as cracking goes. The only solution is to pick the ripening fruits before the plant gets the heavy rain and let them ripen on a shelf or table on your porch or inside. If you see you are going to get a really heavy rain just get out and pick off all of the fruit that is showing any blushing at all. You still may lose some of the larger greenies to cracking but it beats having a bunch of busted fruit that are no good for anything. Our humidity for the past 4 days has hovered between 98% and 100% and then today dropped all the way down to 60%. That is why we have so many foliage diseases. Bill

May 2, 2013	#4
lycomania Tomatovillian™ Join Date: Apr 2013 Location: Zone 5b Posts: 179	I have relatively little experience, but this year I'm using plastic mulch for several reasons, one of which is keeping those torrential waters out of my tomato row. Don't know yet if it's going to help, but there you go.