This is a video miniseries on growing the bush early girl variety of tomato plant from seeds, in this case a commercial product from Berry~Morse consisting o…
Question by ?: Why are the leaves of my tomato plants curling up and looking so pitiful?
4 weeks ago, I planted about 20 Jet Star and Better Boy tomato plants. I used a Miracle Grow soil base, water regularly, and have surrounded plants with mulch to retain moisture. My garden also gets plenty of sunshine. The plants are growing at a pathetic rate and a couple of weeks ago, all the leaves started curling up very tightly, especially the new growth at the top. Now they’re basically all stem, with tight rolled-up leaves. A couple of weeks after planting these, I planted four new plants ( either Big Boy or Better Boy) and they’re doing fine….good color and full foliage with some flowering. It’s for this reason that I doubt there is an issue with the soil.
Any tips on what can be causing this and what I can do about it? Will they recover or should I just uproot and plant new plants now? Have never had this issue in the past. Thanks
Sailor: Wish I had some pics to provide, but I’m at work right now.
Best answer:
Answer by Gardening Sailor
Got any pictures? Lots of things affect tomatoes that cause leaf action like wilts and blights. Crop rotation and soil sanitation are very important if you grow the same crops every year. Heirloom varieties are often susceptible to fungi and molds that resistant hybrids are not. Tomato Leaf Curl is a virus spread by whiteflies. Check the link below and see if that matches your symptoms. If that’s what you have, you’re probably better off pulling them out, disposing of them properly to avoid spreading the infection, and planting a non-tomato crop in that space. Good luck.
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Thanks for watching my plant growing series so avidly! I’m a scientist. I
film and narrate these videos in my spare time. It doesn’t take that long
after you get a lot of experience, but at first it took a really long time.
This is interesting. I appreciate the amount of time you put into this.
Although I can’t help but wonder- when do you film these and what kind of
job do you have?
Hello fellow gardener. Sorry to hear about your tomato plant problem, but I am glad that you care enough to learn more about these great plants. I think it sounds like leaf curl virus. A couple of things can cause this. One reason could be whiteflies. Look under the leaves to see if you have any of these little buggers. They can also get infected during transplant. I will give you a really great link on this virus so you can check it out. If you don’t believe this is what you have then it could heavy temperature and water variations. My experience leads me to think you are probably watering correctly and keeping the soil moist enough for temperature control and proper transpiration. Look into the leaf curl symptoms and see it that gets you anywhere.
Good Luck and Happy Gardening!
Here is a couple of links for you to check out
http://www.gardeningknowhow.com/vegetable/tomato-leaves-curling.htm
http://www.avrdc.org/LC/tomato/tylcv.html
Miracle grow has fertilizer pellets in it. The quantity varies significantly from bag to bag. Some bags will have a great many, other bags will have almost none.
Check your tomato plants to see if the stalk is thick and bumpy. If so, the leaf curl is coming from too much fertilizer. This could account for why the second planting is doing better than the first planting. Fertilizer is water soluble and will leach from the soil in a couple of weeks.
If they have been over fertilized, It will take them a while to recover, but they will recover and then put out massive amounts of foliage, followed by massive blossoms and a very huge crop late in the season. Sometimes the plant will still be growing foliage or in the blossom stage when summer is over, thus the garden myth that Over Fertilized Tomato’s won’t produce Tomato’s. They will produce a huge crop late in the season.