With all that blessed rainfall come new problems for veggie nurseryman - mainly fungal diseases are on the rising .
WOW ! This has been a great monsoon season this year . Last twelvemonth we had 2 tiny monsoon storm and then they melt and we perish into an utmost drought . This class , we have gotten more rain than I can remember in many years . Every week we get a significant amount of rain and 2 calendar week ago we got 2.5 inches of pelting in 1.5 hour . It was torrential . Those of us on the southeast side of Santa Fe have gotten most of the rainwater while those on the west side of town have n’t gotten much .
TOMATOES - EARLY BLIGHT : I already trimmed the tomato plants so no leaves disturb the land , put stubble around each plant so no soil is demonstrate , but I still have start to see Early Blight ( EB ) on a few of the tomato plants . Early Blight fungal spores live in the priming coat and when rain splashes the dirt up on the lower leaves , the fungal spores start to colonize on the grim underside of the leaf . They become blotchy with the lower leaves getting big yellow splotchy area . This is Early Blight . Without doing anything , it will spread upwards and go up through the plant and eventually kill it . But we can ascertain it . I practice to utilise Serenade , a biological fungicide that has other micro - organism that colonise on those foliage and crowds out the EB spores . But now we ca n’t get Serenade anymore . I do n’t acknowledge why but ca n’t find it anywhere . So I ’ve turned to 2 other products . One is called Cease , which has the same fixings as Serenade but is way more expensive and the other is Copper Fungicide which has fuzz in it which helps oppress the exabit disease but you should n’t spray the filth as it can regard the earthworms - keep it on the foliage .
The way to control it is : trim off all lower branches that show signs of EB . Be indisputable to dip your cutters in a solution of 10 % whitener to water . I just put a little in a low container of water and dip the shears and your hand into it BEFORE move to the next industrial plant . EB is transmissible between industrial plant so disinfecting your cutters between plants will verify you do n’t spread it .
SQUASH - POWDERY MILDEW : Another fungous disease on squash and pumpkin plants is Powdery Mildew . If your parting start to die and get a pulverisation on them , you should spray them on top and underside of leaves with a fungicide . Again Cu fungicide , Neem , Baking soda / water mix , GreenCure . My favorite IS Green Cure as it works pretty fast . Spray any of the unnatural plant life at 2 - 3 times with any o the above to get disembarrass of it .
OTHER problem
TOMATO - BLOSSOM END putrefaction : There are other problems arising from too much rain ( is that possible out here in the southwest ? ! ) Tomato flower rot is from too much water , or mismatched watering or not enough atomic number 20 in the stain ( leached out because of too much pelting ) . It is not a fungous disease but rather adeficiency of calciumin the love apple . It look on the bottom of the tomato and is a sunken brown lesion . you may cut it out and consume the residuum of the tomato if the whole fruit is not impacted .
Keeping the soil evenly moist helps . If we get a magnanimous rain , deform off your dribble system for a day or two . you may also do a foliar spray on the plants with a kelp ( seaweed ) solution . But unremarkably it will correct itself thru prison term . Adding calcium in the variety of pearl meal , oyster shell gunpowder or gypsum — to the soilwhen you plantusually facilitate forbid this job from developing .
