On 08 Nov 2004 14:26:33 -0500, wrote:

Worst year ever, cold, wet, disease.
Put up 1 quart of cooked down tomatoes,
down from my usual 4-8 gallons. Arghhh.

I do rotate.

I don't. I don't have room to rotate.

I grow all heirlooms.

Is there anything I can do to the soil to
make the disease less likely to come back?
I cleaned the top of the soil very carefully,
getting up all the dead bit of leaves I could
find.

What disease was it? What preventive measures have you already
taken?

Should I grow less tasty but more disease
resistant strains next year?

I've been waging war against the spit! Thrips and
their weapon of mass destruction, Tomato Spotted Wilt
virus for several years now. I've tried three hybrid varieties
of tomatoes that are supposed to be resistant to TSWV along
with lots of different heirlooms. Only one of the hybrids really
showed much resistance, it was a numbered, not named variety
that I got from a local nursery.

They produced plenty of tomatoes,but the tomatoes were just
ok. I got fewer tomatoes from the pink Brandywines, but, oh my,
they were delicious! One pink Brandywine is still putting out
tomatoes, although the late blight is finally catching up with it.
I also have found that the Stupice tomatoes showed some resistance,
as did the Andrew Rahart's Jumbo Red. The yellow and red current
tomatoes laughed in the face of the spit! thrips and, while
buried deep in the run amok basil, are still popping out tomatoes.

So, my long, rambly point would be; if you love the taste of the
heirlooms tomatoes as much as I do, you might try doing a little
research or your own experimentation on what kinds show some
resistance to whatever disease it is your tomatoes had.

Hm, and since that puts me over my limit for run on sentences
for the day, I'll go and get some actual work done.


Penelope