Your comments and tips

05 Jan 10, alison (Australia - temperate climate)

Thanks Barb ... novices are always keen but boy I lack knowledge. I'm trying to companion plant and not use pesticides (except my garlic mix). Also heard that "solar sterilisation" will kill organisms - black plastic over bed before planting - weighed down and let the sun kill off the bugs. Oh well, there's always next year! Barb is there anything we can do now to save our tomatoes? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Cheers

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02 Jan 10, Barb (Australia - sub-tropical climate)

Tomatoes and others in the solanacae family (eggplant, capsicum, potato, etc) should be rotated to help avoid wilt diseases and also root knot nematodes - these build up in the soil. Sadly boiling would kill a lot of the good microbes - crop rotation seems the best approach of all. It could even be tomato russet mite that's causing the yellow dying leaves - they're microscopic (invisible to naked eye). Keeping the tomato plants growing well with healthy compost, regular feeding with organic fertiliser and plenty of water does seem to help.

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02 Jan 10, Annalisa (Australia - sub-tropical climate)

I agree. I have put the tommies in new garden beds - maybe I should start checking Ph levels - never have before but always had success. But I guess more effort (and money for ph testing kit) just may pay off. Boiling water - sounds interesting! Thanks.

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01 Jan 10, Alison (Australia - temperate climate)

Annalisa, I'm doing some research on the wilt thing. One site said never plant tomatoes in soil that had previously had tommies grown. No-one down my way has had success this season with tomatoes. Perhaps there's credit in the boiling water prior to planting theory. Too bad this site isn't frequented more - I really like it but don't get too many answers.

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01 Jan 10, Matthew (Australia - cool/mountain climate)

Planted tomatoes they have fruited but no colour coming. Also the plant seems to have a blackish/brownish tinge to the trunk, is this bad.

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30 Dec 09, Annalisa (Australia - sub-tropical climate)

Anxiously awaiting answers about wilting. I had success last year with tommies, and this year, all five plants had to be ripped out with green tommies all over due to disease. Is it in the soil? I use seaweed fertiliser... Pretty tired of fighting this thing, but willing to fight on. I want some healthy tommies!

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28 Dec 09, Alison (Australia - temperate climate)

Just south of Wollongong NSW, my beef steak's are about 6ft tall and were very slow to show flowers. Now I think I have a wilt fungus as the bottom leaves are turning yellow and dying. What do "they" mean when they say you shouldn't grow tomatoes in soil that previously had tomatoes in it? Perhaps the boiling water idea in November. Apparently eggplants are also affected by the same wilt - Vermillician or something like that. Any help or ideas guys? Cheers

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11 Dec 09, lisa (Australia - sub-tropical climate)

I have grown my tomatoes from seed from big tomatoes yet all five bushes are growing small cherry tomatoe size fruit lots and lots of them, what have i done wrong?

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11 Dec 09, Helena (Australia - temperate climate)

John - by any chance is it possible that you live somewhere close to Melbourne? Would like to see your savagelly clipped tomatoes. Grandmother (63) (interested ONLY in gardening)

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26 Nov 09, Freyja (Australia - temperate climate)

We are growing veggies for the first time and have started with tomatoes, pumpkins and zucchini. Of our eight cherry tomato seedlings - five are growing ok but slowly, two are hardly growing but look otherwise healthy and one has grown a little but looks a bit sick and slightly yellow. Two Black Krim seedlings seem ok, just slower than I had hoped. I'm feeding them seasol and am about introduce seasol powerfeed. They were planted into a well prepared bed with mushroom compost, cow manure, lucerne hay and premium garden soil. Does the sick one have a disease? Should I remove it? Also I think one of the pumpkin seedlings might have powdery mildew, do I need to remove it? Thanks, Freyja

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