I've had Brandywine woes. They produced so many flowers and each one of those flowers fell off. I read on the Ga gardener forum on Gardenweb that brandywines were difficult to grow around here, but I thought to give it a try. Something was obviously wrong with the plants given the foliage.
I was so scared that since whatever it was had passed from one plant to the other that it was going to pass to the other tomatoes that were very close by, so, I pulled them both. I was sad to do it, but I'll try them again next year. I may have gotten some bad seed or something.
I planted cucumbers in their spot since the ones I have in the ground may be too shaded to do much. If not, I'll be swimming in cucumbers. There could be worse things in life. I also planted some marigolds and geraniums today. I found some more squash bug eggs and another spotted cucumber beetle, so hopefully this will help some.
The ants, however, are attacking all of my zucchini flowers. I remember last year they attacked the flowers of my zipper peas and they made the whole flower head fall off and not produce the pod. I'm worried the same will happen here. Any ideas? I don't want to dust the flowers with anything because of the bees, but I also do not want to lose any zucchini.
No ideas about your ants, but sorry about the Brandywines.
ReplyDeleteI may end up relying on my volunteers this year, if anything goes wrong in the tomato patch!
Oh no! I read your post title and my heart sank! You are right though, if something is infected it can spread like wildfire to your other tomatoes. I wish you luck that all your others will be healthy and happy and give you loads of yumminess! Sometimes we just have to admit when something isn't working and put on the "brave face" and get rid of it, LOL!
ReplyDeleteSorry about your Brandywines. I have read that mint deters ants. You could place a pot of mint in the garden near the plants and see if that works. You will also have some nice mint to use!
ReplyDeleteSo sorry about the brandywines. I have an heirloom variety of tomato growing back there but the leaves are curling now.
ReplyDeleteSorry nature is not being kind, wish I had something helpful to suggest
ReplyDeleteOuch. Yeah, that's some kind of disease you had there. I use mancozeb on mine to thwart early blight and other diseases.
ReplyDeleteI don't know what it is, but it sure enough seems to have spread to the other major tomato bed. I'm in huge tomato trouble if it spreads.
ReplyDeleteTo bad about the BW tomatoes. I grew one last year and it only produced one tomato. I am trying one again this year so hopefully I have better luck.
ReplyDeleteBrandywines die in my yard, too. They get verticillium wilt. When you are sure your plants are dead, cut the main stem crosswise to see if it has a dead/brown streak running up the inside. That would be a clue.
ReplyDeleteI've had better luck with Cherokee purple, which is also large and delicious but which seems to take the disease pressure here in Georgia a bit better.
That looks like a bit of fungal blight you have going there. It's very common here in Kentucky. If you catch it early enough you can treat it with a fungicide (copper is the best, but if you're trying to do organic that won't do). You might want to treat your still living plants with a fungicide just to be on the safe side. It also stays in the soil and on your trellis so make sure you treat the trellis and your tools with bleach solution and the soil with a fungicide before planting anything else in that area.
ReplyDeleteI was able to repel ants in my garden by sprinkling cinnamon on the dirt around my plants. I dont think it hurts the ants or orhter bugs but they hate the smell! Also, when there are a lot of ants around, it could be a sign of aphids(ants actually farm the honey dew that the aphids collect). I had this happen on my fava beans, and I shot them with bursts of water. It helped a lot, but I had to keep doing it.
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