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TOMATO BLIGHT- What to do next year?
Jill Stephens
Posts: 26
My tomato crop was ruined by blight this year. I understand I can't plant tomatoes or potatoes in the same plot for 3-4 years! How far away do I need to plant next years plants- 1 metre- 3 metres or 10 metres away? Also is it OK to plant any other crop in place of the former? Would a bonfire on the spot kill the fungus, or is there some other way to clean up the plot? Can I plant anything except tomatoes and potatoes in the same space?
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Try this link Jill to the RHS, plenty of useful advice and a link or two there.
https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=217
Jill, your situation isn't as dire as you think. "Blight" has become a generic term for the various fungal diseases that can affect tomatoes. The most common in the domestic garden are Early Blight and Septoria Leaf Spot.
Your soil hasn't been poisoned, per se. In all likelihood, fungal spores will have fallen from the plants to the soil beneath. They can and will survive a winter on top of the soil. The danger in planting next season in the same, untouched soil is that watering the plants will splash the spores back up onto the new plants' foliage, thus infecting them.
For space reasons, I've planted toms in the same spot for a decade or more. Prior to planting in a new season, I turn over the soil very well, burying any spores. Underground, they can't do any damage. Then I refresh the soil on top. Any fungal problems I suffer during the new season will be the result of fresh infections during the season. Fungal spores are airborne, they travel on the breeze.
Not a bad idea. There are hybrid varieties around that are marketed as resistant to various fungal diseases. It doesn't mean they won't contract disease, just that they should cope better with it.
That said, the common fungal diseases - apart from Late Blight - take a long time to knock over a plant. Good housekeeping - removing affected foliage at the first sign of symptoms - should see the plant through to the end of the season. Late Blight is a different matter. It spells curtains.
Thanks to everyone who has been kind enough to reply to my query. With all the various suggestions offered, I should be able to produce a blight-free, or at least a blight controlled, crop of tomatoes next year. Thank you all again!
I live in SW France, Jill. I see you live in mid W France. But blight was very bad all around here last year. Some years blight is bad and other years there is hardly any. It seems worse when the summer is wetter than usual. I grow tomatoes every year, sometimes very successfully, sometimes not. You could spray them with something anti fungal like bouillie bordelaise.
That's funny, had notification by email of this thread, but I hadn't written on it before and now I see it dates from last September!