This Forum will close on Wednesday 27 March, 2024. Please refer to the announcement on the Discussions page for further detail.
Blight
Ken Smith
Posts: 9
Bon jour from Deux Sevre,
my crops have suffered from blight for the past 2 years even though I have moved them to different raised beds on the plot, I was considering not growing them at all next year but I noticed that my quince tree seems to be suffering as well, leaves turning brown/black and falling off. Do quince suffer from blight and if so what steps should I take next year?
Two neighbours have grown tomatoes, one, like me has lost his whole crop, the other, has got a marvelous crop!!
Looking forward to any advice,
cheers
Ken Smith
0
Posts
The blight that affects potatoes and tomatoes only affects plants of the solanum family, so whatever is affecting your quince tree, it won't be potato blight.
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Ken, interesting that one neighbour suffered as you did while the other has a marvellous crop. Blight is a fungal problem and the fungal spores mainly arrive on the breeze. There's no avoiding them, they're airborne. Exactly how or why one out of three adjacent crops managed to miss the spores is a bit of a mystery. What sort of precautions did the unaffected grower take?
Could it be down to the prevailing wind direction?
Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.
Possibly, but on a still day the spores will just drift. There has to be another explanation. I wonder whether the unaffected grower is diligent with housekeeping.
Sarpo series potatoes show great resistance to potato blight.
They can be grown at the side of blighted potatoes and be unaffected.
I have blighted Lady Baldwin, and totally unaffected Sarpo mira
Hi Ken, have you tried spraying your tomatoes with Bordeaux mixture? (Bouillie Bordelaise here in France). I have lost nearly all my tomatoes this year to blight, it being so wet and windy. I didn't spray them this year and this is what has happened, but having said that, my neighbours are fine. I too grow them in raised beds and this has been the worst year ever.
Have you had the very violent winds up there? this could be why the quince leaves have blackened.
Bon soir,
thanks for the replies, Yann's garden, with the perfect crop is about 200 metres diagonally N.E. from mine which lies in a hollow, Daniel's, blighted, 200 metres E of Yann's, on the same level. I visited a mate's house 2k away yesterday and he has lost all his toms to the dreaded blight. I did spray my crop at the first sign with Bordeaux mixture to no avail, we've not had any real gales this year but we have had more rain than ever before and the run off from the road which passes close to the quince has been in full flood for far longer than previous years.
Never mind, try again next year,
cheers, Ken S
Ken, if you're going to spray against blight it has to be preventive - spraying before any symptoms appear. You're coating the leaves to help against the fungal spores getting a grip. Once you see symptoms they already have a grip and you can't kill them off, per se. Your only option then is to remove and destroy the affected leaves. Preventive spraying starts not long after the toms are planted out and continues roughly weekly subject to the weather. Rain means respraying.