Hello, I have some tomato plants with the dreaded blight next to sweetcorn which also looks sick. Please could you let me know if it is transferable to the other plants in my garden and if any blight treatments are ok for them, I know it is likely that my potatoes will succumb but am worried about courgettes and the sweetcorn. Thanks very much.
When you say "the dreaded blight" it depends exactly which fungal problem you have on the toms. It might not even be fungal. It could be bacterial. Can you post a photo?
As Geoff says, toms and spuds are both prone to a couple of the same fungal diseases. One is Late Blight. If you have Late Blight, the tomato plant will be wiped out within a week or ten days. If your plants have been coping for that or longer it's probably not Late Blight. Early Blight, another common tomato fungal problem, can also affect spuds, though, as with toms, it's nowhere near as destructive.
I've never heard of any of the tomato/potato fungal diseases affecting sweet corn. Sweet corn only has one fungal threat that I know of. It's called "smut" and you'd know whether your plants are affected. The kernels expand to three or four times their size and are a dark grey/purple colour. It looks hideous, though, in some parts of the world, it's a delicacy. I get it a lot on my sweet corn here in Italy.
In terms of dealing with your disease problem now, it's too late for prevention. Once the spores are in place, you can't kill them, per se. You can only try to minimise the impact by removing affected foliage to try to stop the spread.
Thank you both for your help, I have been working today in the garden, removing the worst affected tomato plants and will have a closer look at the sweetcorn tomorrow. It is disheartening when you put so much work into growing and nurturing these plants, sometimes I wonder if it is all worth it, but I'm sure I will try again next year.
Having done some internet research, Italophile is spot on. This is Late Blight, the same that caused the Irish potato famine in the 19c. It thrives in the damp conditions that we have experienced this year. As suggested, prevention is better than cure (If indeed there is a cure) Italophile's measures have been endorsed by a number of sites. Hope no-one has suffered as badly as I have in losing the whole crop.
There's no cure, Colin, not just for Late Blight but for any of the other fungal diseases. Once the spores have arrived and settled in - when the symptoms are showing - you can't kill them off. The same applies to most fungal garden problems - Black Spot on roses, etc.
All you can do is try to mimimise their effects after arrival or take preventive measures - prior to their arrival - by either spraying or undertaking the basic housekeeping procedures I've mentioned here so many times.
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When you say "the dreaded blight" it depends exactly which fungal problem you have on the toms. It might not even be fungal. It could be bacterial. Can you post a photo?
As Geoff says, toms and spuds are both prone to a couple of the same fungal diseases. One is Late Blight. If you have Late Blight, the tomato plant will be wiped out within a week or ten days. If your plants have been coping for that or longer it's probably not Late Blight. Early Blight, another common tomato fungal problem, can also affect spuds, though, as with toms, it's nowhere near as destructive.
I've never heard of any of the tomato/potato fungal diseases affecting sweet corn. Sweet corn only has one fungal threat that I know of. It's called "smut" and you'd know whether your plants are affected. The kernels expand to three or four times their size and are a dark grey/purple colour. It looks hideous, though, in some parts of the world, it's a delicacy. I get it a lot on my sweet corn here in Italy.
In terms of dealing with your disease problem now, it's too late for prevention. Once the spores are in place, you can't kill them, per se. You can only try to minimise the impact by removing affected foliage to try to stop the spread.
Having done some internet research, Italophile is spot on. This is Late Blight, the same that caused the Irish potato famine in the 19c. It thrives in the damp conditions that we have experienced this year. As suggested, prevention is better than cure (If indeed there is a cure) Italophile's measures have been endorsed by a number of sites. Hope no-one has suffered as badly as I have in losing the whole crop.
There's no cure, Colin, not just for Late Blight but for any of the other fungal diseases. Once the spores have arrived and settled in - when the symptoms are showing - you can't kill them off. The same applies to most fungal garden problems - Black Spot on roses, etc.
All you can do is try to mimimise their effects after arrival or take preventive measures - prior to their arrival - by either spraying or undertaking the basic housekeeping procedures I've mentioned here so many times.