On Sat, 14 Aug 2004 22:18:42 +0000, RF wrote:

Hello,

I am new to gardening. My plants were doing great until 2 weeks ago. All
growth stopped, leaves started turning yellow, and wilting. I backed off
watering at the time, but it didn't help, ( I was watering once a day).
Now I hear this blight is going accross Pennsylvainia. Here they are...

RF

This is most likely NOT blight. The larger leaves are the ones that have
turned yellow. This is a sign of low nitrogen levels. The plant will
'steal' nitrogen from older leaves so younger ones can be produced. In the
third photo, one can plainly see aphids. The plant's fluids are being
consumed by these creatures. As far as the slowing of the plant's growth,
this could be due to the season starting to come to a close. The days are
becoming shorter and the plant is trying to ripen it's fruit.

What I would reccommend:
1 Fertilize the plant with liquid fertilizer. Not heavily. Too much will
cause the plant more stress.
2 Remove the aphids. Purchase an insecticidal soap (I use consurn...
wrong spelling?). Use as directed. It may take a few times to clean all of
them off.
3 Pinch off the younger, non-producing stems. No reason to grow stems that
will never produce fruit. Remove all dead leaves.

Good Luck.......