Tomato plant problem

rhonin

First time growing a tomato plant this year. Its in a pot.
The plant has been really thriving up until the last week when I noticed some of the leaves are turning yellow with some black spots on it. I have been feeding it once a week. Any idea whats the cause of this?

gsxr1

mine where also doing that. I upped the feeds now to once every watering(everyday) .

Now they are perfect again

Corsendonk

Feed Feed Feed!! Plant has used up the nutrients in the compost and whatever your applying in the form of feed is not enough. So step up the rate of feeding.

rhonin

Thanks for the advice. I'll up the feeding.

Jumpy

Seriously? Mine are doing this and I have feed blocks at the bottom of every pot and I water them daily with that stuff that smells like Bovril.

I thought It was because I was overfeeding them.

Corsendonk

Well hard to tell what your issue is, tomatoes are very hungrey plants when they put on growth. Your tomato feed is usual made up of a mix of the 3 main of
Nitrogen- foilage growth, gives you that lovely green look but too much can lead to loads of leaves and not much fruit.
Calcuim, needed for fruit development otherwise you get blossom end rot, hot weather is a factor too.
Potassium- gives good even colour to tomato and flavour.

Link to the extreme examples of deficiency in tomatoes. You can get similiar problems when you Overdose the plant too.

Photo of my crop, I feed 4 times a week and water once-twice a day depending on temp. Toms are grown in sand so highly unlikely I will overwater but on a cool raining day I cut back. The crop was transplanted from seed box into pots containing peat before planting into the soil. I think the problem some people have here is there plants were planted in containers too small and they dont feed enough. Sorry photos won't shrink to fit.

galah

can't really make it out on the picture 100 % but it looks like magnesium deficiency (mine had that ;-() - try adding some epsom salts to the water, that 'cured' out matoes...

gsxr1

My thinking is that the people that make main brand Tomato feed know what they are at. It says on my bottle to feed every watering(pot plants). Im guessing they have a very generic formula that works well on every plant.

I also am having good results with the same feed on my carrots and flowers in the garden. Much better than the year before.

I did over do it on one plant (misread the label) and it drooped a little . I flushed the whole plant with a bucket of water and it came around in one day. Its pure green and is bursting with life now. some of my tomato plants are hitting 7 feet tall with the stuff .

I am still waiting for a ripe crop though. When they do come I will have over 1000 fruits from my 20 plants.

Corsendonk

Try getting some potassium Nitrate, place a pinch near the base of the plant and water it in. Should speed up the ripening.

Wheelnut

At the risk of a semi-hijack: when the tomatoes eventually turn red, are they finished growing? I've been watering, feeding etc and now some of the tomatoes have turned red and look ripe, but they're only about half the size of shop-bought tomatoes.

Corsendonk

Pick them! otherwise the birds will. Might not be as big as the shop due to the variety your growing or your growing outside? All the tomatoes you see in supermarkets are grown in glasshouses(Irish, UK, Dutch) or giant polly tunnels(spanish) where with controlled watering and feeding plus a constant temp the toms can reach max size. As you pick the others will ripen. If you leave them on the plant the fruit just falls off overripe and the plant dies off quicker. Anyway if you wait for them all to ripen at once you be fed up with eating toms after 2 days. If you pick them even when still orange the tomato will continue to ripen in your kitchen. For the best flavour never store in the fridge.