The bottom picture is our tomato row as it looks now. Top pictures are of the blight lesions starting.
We managed to avoid it for quite a while, but over the rainy weekend the dreaded Late Blight reared its ugly head in our tomato patch. Now we are grateful that during the Farm Tour we kept all visitors away from the tomatoes and potatoes - although these really were the most interesting and beautiful production areas right now. We're using Soap Shield - a copper product - to treat all plants, and we have removed 8 trash bags of leaves that showed signs of lesions. Some plants were removed entirely. At this point the outlook for tomatoes is dismal, as the forecast only shows ideal blight conditions: thunderstorms, overcast skies, high humidity. Dry, bright clear days would be most welcome, as the UV light kills the spores.
We'll keep you posted. And enjoy those tomatoes whenever you can get them - they'll be in very short supply in the entire NorthEast this year.
For an interesting read, check out this latest NYT article on the blight titled: "You say Tomato, I say Disaster" .:http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/09/opinion/09barber.html
