It's raining!

[Redbaron]

It hit over 100 today and my plants were showing some heat stress. But it is raining and everything cooled off nice! Woo Hoo .

Totally unexpected since most the weathermen had the odds of rain pretty low.

Better news yet, looks like a week straight in the low to mid 80's is forecast starting Sunday. This will be the week I need to set some fruit!! Crossing fingers and toes! I have been worried since this spring made everything late. This may just tip the balance for the year.

[tlintx]

Nice. We're in the 100s with clouds or rain for the next ten days. Hoping there's some rain, since last time it was predicted we got none.


Tl

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by tlintx

Nice. We're in the 100s with clouds or rain for the next ten days. Hoping there's some rain, since last time it was predicted we got none.


Tl

Gosh TL how do you stand that heat with humidity? I am finding South Fla. almost unbearable and we are only around 92 with feels like of 101 today. Thinking about it gives me a hot flash!

Marsha

[tlintx]

I just think how glad I am I don't live even further south! Always somebody hotter and more humid!

Not quite this hot - 100 degrees (109 index) today and supposedly 106 tomorrow - but generally I love it. It's bright and sunny today, not a cloud in the sky. Going to go out soon and mix up a batch of soil.

I move slow and spend quite a bit of the middle of the day inside. Was just thinking earlier how nice it is to have two more gardening seasons to plan this year!

[b54red]

I've been getting almost daily showers for weeks now and it is making using any fungicides useless and the diseases are certainly taking advantage of the weather. I now have Septoria and the only treatment I have been able to do is the bleach spray which is not as effective on the constantly wet leaves. I need a few days break in the rain so I can apply a fungicide that will stay on long enough to do some good. The last two times I applied a fungicide it was washed off within hours.

Bill

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by b54red

I've been getting almost daily showers for weeks now and it is making using any fungicides useless and the diseases are certainly taking advantage of the weather. I now have Septoria and the only treatment I have been able to do is the bleach spray which is not as effective on the constantly wet leaves. I need a few days break in the rain so I can apply a fungicide that will stay on long enough to do some good. The last two times I applied a fungicide it was washed off within hours.

Bill

I swear, I hate Septoria soooo much!
I would really be interested to hear if the bleach works well on it. Copper "controls" it. Very frustrating.

Marsha

[b54red]

Originally Posted by ginger2778

I swear, I hate Septoria soooo much!
I would really be interested to hear if the bleach works well on it. Copper "controls" it. Very frustrating.

Marsha

Marsha I don't think anything will control it in these conditions. No way to apply any fungicides unless we get a break and if we don't get one soon I won't have any foliage left that isn't infected. I sprayed with bleach again this morning on very wet plants. We got about 3/4 of an inch yesterday. It has been a rare day lately when it didn't rain at least 3 or 4 times in 24 hours. Even with the heat we are having it is very difficult for plants to get good and dry with near 100% humidity most of the time between showers. I'm not sure the bleach is doing too much good in these conditions.

I still have some plants suffering from stunted leaves from my last application of copper and at the higher concentrations it seems to do a fair amount of burning on some of the leaves. I found the copper fairly ineffective at the lower dose recommendations but at the level where it seems to work I got too much damage. I have had fairly good luck preventing Septoria with Daconil when it wasn't so wet but I need a break in the rain for it to work.

Bill

Bill

[amideutch]

Bill, your going to have to put a roof over their heads. It wont help with the high humidity but at least it will make your fungicide/Daconil applications more effective.

Ami

[tlintx]

I was just thinking that. Could you built a hoop house or a lathe house?

Not a drop of rain, not a cloud in the sky, not a single thunderstorm so far this week.

I was going to say it doesn't feel too hot out there today, but I just checked WU and it's supposedly 103 out there, with a heat index of 124.

Holy moly. It's supposed to be 108 today!

[ginger2778]

Originally Posted by b54red

Marsha I don't think anything will control it in these conditions. No way to apply any fungicides unless we get a break and if we don't get one soon I won't have any foliage left that isn't infected. I sprayed with bleach again this morning on very wet plants. We got about 3/4 of an inch yesterday. It has been a rare day lately when it didn't rain at least 3 or 4 times in 24 hours. Even with the heat we are having it is very difficult for plants to get good and dry with near 100% humidity most of the time between showers. I'm not sure the bleach is doing too much good in these conditions.

I still have some plants suffering from stunted leaves from my last application of copper and at the higher concentrations it seems to do a fair amount of burning on some of the leaves. I found the copper fairly ineffective at the lower dose recommendations but at the level where it seems to work I got too much damage. I have had fairly good luck preventing Septoria with Daconil when it wasn't so wet but I need a break in the rain for it to work.

Bill

Bill

Bill, that is for sure about copper stunting leaf growth at higher concentrations. It was pretty effective though at the lower but still recommended dosage, with very much less leaf stunting, for my Septoria outbreak this season. I used it stronger, the leaves had a blue tinge,and did get the leaf stunting, but in about 3 weeks they grew out of it, even the affected leaves. It did take a few days to find out if the copper spray worked. I cut off all the affected leaves, sprayed, then watched, and usually I saw no or very little additional damage, at least for several weeks. By that I mean it was apparent the damage wasn't spreading.
My Septoria outbreak didn't respond to Daconil. I saw continued spotting, and leaf damage and spread for 3 more days. That is when I went to the copper spray.
I tried foliar sprays with Actinovate, and aspirin( different sprays) but it was too late for those, I was beyond prevention at that time.
I also didn't have the rain stress that you are having, there were generally no more than 2 days with rain in a row, and it wasn't an all day thing. We have to garden in the winter here, and that's our dry season. ( That's when overnight temps finally fall below 70 degrees for them to be able to set fruit).
I really feel for you with this disease stress.

Marsha

[nolabelle]

I'm learning so much information here that I wonder if I'll ever be successful at growing tomatoes.

Why are tomatoes so susceptable to disease? Seems all the time is spent preventing diseases (or pests, which is common for all plants). But tomatoes and their diseases almost put a damper on one's enthusiasm. I said "almost" because I'm bound and determined to grow decent tomatoes before I die. I'm happy to have you all to help me to do so. Thank you!

[tlintx]

I don't think tomatoes are that hard to grow. I think we're just really obsessed with getting the most out of any given season. I mean, if you go to a photography forum, you'll read a lot about equipment and lenses and lighting issues and what not, but ultimately, a simple point and shoot will get most people the results they want with little fuss. And a lot of times, the first thing that gets a person interested in joining a topical forum is when they run into a problem!

I don't spray or shield or disinfect and I over and underwater, and I had a very nice Spring season. If I were more diligent, I'd probably be eating bigger fresh tomatoes right now, maybe, but I'm still picking Red Figs and that's fine by me! My MIL grew her tomatoes on her driveway in pots and her season ended about the same time as mine. Just too hot to keep up with it, too hot and humid to set fruit.

I've learned a MASSIVE amount this season, and I'm excited to apply it in a few months for fall. I want to have my garden be one of the last to close up shop, not one of the first! I think a lot depends on climate, too. Some are more challenging than others.

Anyway, it's so hot outside I'm thinking about doing laundry. I'm giving my poor forgotten in the sunshine for two hours seedlings about 50% change of bouncing back at this point. You know what that means... time to order more seeds!

[Ivo I]

Hi,everybody!I would like to get some recommendations about using Daconil.Do I need to sprey my plants every time after the rain or I need to keep the instructions-once a week.Thank's