5 Tips on How to Prevent and Treat Common Tomato Diseases

Dear fellow gardeners, the time has come for you to move into a final stage of the battle against tomato pests and diseases. As you know, an introduction to this topic was made in the posts that speak of growingdisease resistant tomatoes and also some things you didn’t know about tomato diseases. Now that we’ve passed the basics I feel it’s a good time to go further and see how to prevent and treat common, most frequent tomato diseases. 

Timely Reaction and Disease Prevention Gets You a Smiling Tomato

   

Out of numerous diseases that attack tomatoes I’d like to focus on the most annoying ones: septoria leaf spot, anthracnose, fusarium and verticillium wilt, early blight and late blight.

1. Septoria Leaf Spot is a notorious fungus that attacks tomato leaves and creates tiny gray-black spots which resemble the traces of cigarette burns. You can repress this plant disease during the planting phase by leaving enough space between your tomato plants. The space item is equally important for allowing the proper air circulation.   

2. Anthracnose has a funny name and an unfriendly attitude towards tomatoes. You’ll recognize it by a small, ugly-looking ring-like area on your tomato plants. The easiest treatment for this fungus is achieved by annual rotation of the planting location.

3. Fusarium and Verticillium Wilt are both caused by fungi that live in soil and enter a susceptible tomato plant through its roots. Fusarium wilt is common in hot, humid areas and it causes tomato leaves and stems to turn yellow.

Verticillium wilt disturbs the water circulation from roots to other parts of tomato plant. Ultimately, it triggers off yellow and brownish marks on leaf tips and veins. These two annoying tomato diseases can be beaten by planting disease resistant tomato varieties and by avoiding overwatering. The worst case scenario requires removing and destroying of all infected plants. 

4. Early Blight is another tomato disease caused by a fungus. It appears in a form of brown or black dots on lower leaves and stem ends of fruits. This tomato disease usually attacks after a plant begins to set fruit.

The way for you to deal with early blight is to rotate plants to a new planting space every year. Another useful tip is to maintain tomato foliage dry and to make sure the plants are not crowded. Also, use sticks to raise the lower foliage off the ground.

5. Late Blight occurs during mild and rainy summers. It is also known as a water mold. Plants infected by this disease will have leathery patches on leaves and subsequently fruits.

You can stop it by promoting good air circulation around your tomato and by watering the plant at the base without wetting the foliage. However, the first line of defense is based on planting only disease free seeds from a well-known seed supplier.

Have questions about preventing tomato diseases? Let me know and I’ll try to help!