In article ,
Dan Musicant wrote:

On Sun, 04 Jul 2010 12:22:54 -0700, Billy
wrote:

:In article ,
: Dan Musicant wrote:
:
: Year after year I've been growing 6 Early Girl tomatoes in a patch
: surrounded by concrete, the patch being 11 feet by 25 inches. I usually
: get terrific results. I dig out the soil about 2 feet down (in late
: March if I try to dig deeper I just reach standing water) and mix about
: 1/4 compost with 3/4 soil back into the ditch and plant the seedlings.
:
:Are you near the Berkeley hills? We had late rains in May/June and the
:water table may still be up, in which case, you may be getting root rot.
:I'd take a post hole digger, and dig down 3', or so, to try to find
:where the water table is now. At 4 ft. in height, the tomato will have
:found it by now. My suggestion would be to stop watering your plants,
:and give them a foliar feeding of potassium/phosphate (for general
:health, and supporting root growth).
:
:The symptoms don't seem to match any deficiencies that I'm aware of, so
:I'm left with the water as the culprit.

Not too near the hills, I'm near Ashby BART station. Guess it could be
root rot, I wouldn't know. You don't think testing PH is necessary?

I shouldn't water lightly just to keep the top 6 inches from drying out?

How would I do a foliar feeding such as you suggest? I have some Miracle
Gro, also some chemical fertilizer (dry 16-16-16), but so far this year
I've gone organic. I'm not averse to using chemicals if called for,
though.

Dan



Email: dmusicant at pacbell dot net

I'd dig a test hole 3 ft. deep to see if the water table is in that
range, if not we can scratch our heads together.

If you do have a high water table, with the amount of compost that you
added, moisture should wick-up, so I wouldn't worry about any
supplimental watering (provided of course that it is a high water
table).

Potassium and phosphate seems like it would be the same for chemical
gardening, or organic gardening. Wetting agents and such may be
different. I've never used foliar sprays, except for compost tea.

Dig the hole first.
--
- Billy
"Fascism should more properly be called corporatism because it is the
merger of state and corporate power." - Benito Mussolini.
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