"Peter Richards" wrote in message
news
Hi Steve,

On Fri, 10 Oct 2003 18:17 +0100 (BST), (Steve
Harris) wrote:

In article ,
(Peter Richards) wrote:

Our new tomato plants are showing signs of dark brown and light purple
patches on the leaves, obviously blight.

This is a very silly time of year to be bothering about new tomato
plants unless you are a long way from the UK.

I forgot to mention that I live in Australia, and before I get flamed
for posting on a UK newsgroup, here is my rationale:

1. I searched through the newsgroups for "organic", and this one
certainly had the most postings, therefore this was the best NG to
post my question.

Once could apply the same reasoning to a problem with your palm trees or
coffee crop!

2. Tomatoes are, .... well, tomatoes, it doesn't matter where they
are grown (UK or Oz), and no doubt in the UK, tomato blight would be a
problem also, therefore it was this NG I was seeking an answer.

I've never experienced it, maybe others have, so AFAIK tomato blight isnt a
problem in the UK. Its also a very imprecise term and could apply to
hundreds of different actual diseases of fungal origin. And since the only
way of killing some sort of fungus without harming the plants would be with
a chemical of one derivation of another (shock horror!!), then for you,
burning the affected plants seems to be the best (and organic) way, since
you'll be hugely reducing the chances of the infection spreading, something
you wouldnt get with any cure that isnt 100%.


3. Even if I lived in the UK, this would not be a 'silly' time of the
year to plant tomatoes (i.e. I may have a hothouse).

Incorrect, it would still be a silly time of year unless you also installed
powerful lighting to compensate for the shortened day length, however hot
your house (lets not even consider the economics of doing it either...£5
tomato anyone?)

Your description matches tomato leaf mould. I had quite a bit of this
for months but it didn't spread much and I had a superb crop without
spraying.

This is spreading, and yes, appears to be some sort of mould or fungal
disease. As we saw a show on TV that recommended milk for fixing many
tomato 'woes', we have sprayed the plants with milk. It will either
kill them or cure them I guess.

There are two chances it will work...fat, and slim. In the meantime, the
infection is free to spread to the rest of your plants, and you are also
losing time to grow tomatoes, since you could just burn them and plant some
new ones immediately (in another spot obviously, or at least not in the same
soil.)

You have been given the organic remedy, its called "fire".

--
Tumbleweed

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