Tomato Blight

This is the effect of last season's wet summer on my tomato plants.

It wasn't the cold that caused the blight, it was the rain - day after day - the leaves of plants could barely get dry between showers.

However, on a dryer, happier note, it is not going to happen to my plants this season!

Every outdoor plant is either under a shelter of some kind or can be moved under cover if we get prolonged periods of rain. That's one of the advantages of growing bush tomatoes in large pots etc. is that they can be moved if necessary.

Of course there are blight tolerant varieties available - I use the word tolerant rather than resistant because even these varieties could not cope and went down with blight. The two varieties I'm referring to are Ferline and Legend.

I've sometimes heard people say "the rain will do them good" well, a little drop maybe, but wet leaves for more than a day or two will probably result in the beginnings of what you see in the picture above!

Tomato Blight

My wife and I have recently returned home from a great holiday in Northumberland. Although it rained everyday, we did have a good time visiting the North East and the Edinburgh fringe.
It also rained everywhere else in the UK and when we got home many of our outdoor plants were affected with tomato blight.

As you can see, this fungal disease affects both plant and fruit and will also spread to other tomato plants that are close-by.

The best thing to do in this situation is to bag-up these plants and their fruit and leave them to be collected by the regular waste collection service.

If you have been growing tomato plants outdoors in the UK this season and they are not affected by the wet weather that we've had, you're doing very well!

Now that weather predictions are such that we could be getting wet summers every year, outdoor plants will need some kind of protection from the rain.

Is This Really July?

This is what you may expect earlier in the season but the constant rain that we've been having in the UK means that if you have just a few plants, it may be a good idea to cover-up!

Finding ways to protect your tomatoes from rain is probably the biggest challenge for those who grow tomatoes outdoors.

Wet leaves, for a prolonged period, means there is a high chance of blight ... a fungal disease that also affects potatoes. Some varieties are less susceptible, such as Ferline and Legend, but even these are not totally blight resistant.

Another problem with rain is that it drains the soil of nutrients. This could be quite useful later in the season when there may be a build up of nutrients and a flush-through of water would be helpful.

However, as the fruit continues to swell a constant supply of nutrients are needed so even if the plants are well watered, they still need feeding!