help..the bottoms of my tomatoes are rotting as they ripen

[I & H]

I have loads of beautiful green plum tomatoes just waiting to become sauce. The first two were reddening up so I picked them yesterday, from low on the plant, and the bottoms were completely rotted out. The same thing happened to most of my big boys last year. As soon as they start to ripen and pink up, they develop a area of rot/mold at the bottom. The longer I waited to pick, the more they dissolved so that they were just half-tomatoes, beautiful, red, half rotten tomatoes...darn. The plants are pretty crowded in my garden, they grew full and wide rather than tall (I haven't planted plum tomatoes before), but the plants and green tomatoes seem healthy until they start to pink up. Is it a water problem? We've had a cool wet season here in New England. Please help me save my sauce.....

Also, anyone have a good recipe for pesto? My basil patch took off this year and I have boatloads of it ready. Looks like everyone will get pesto for Christmas this year...

-Holly

[DigitalVinyl]

Sounds like it could be blossom end rot. a nice picture here

common enough issue for tomatoes. DO a web search you'll find plenty about it. Lack of calcium in the dirt the trigger for it but I think there is a water stress (too much/little) component to it as well.

I've not had this problem yet. I save eggs shells (i microwave the empty shells to avoid really bad smells. I then crush them up (mortar and pestal). I add some to the dirt at the begining and end of season.

I also use a liquid seaweed fertilizer whenever I have sick plants. It does contain calcium. It can be used as a foliar(on leaves) or added to the dirt. I'm not sure what the quickest way to help the plants would be.

On squash I've gotten young fruit that are rotting from the end when they are still not full size. They are soft and fragile. Literally I touched one zucchini and the last two inches collapsed off into a wet mass on the ground. I was shocked. I just got another one yesterday. I've assumed it was insufficiently pollinated. I've had two zucchini and 3-4 yellow squash do that.

DiGiTAL ViNYL (no email) Zone 6b/7, Westchester Co, NY,

[TQ]

Sounds like blossom end rot, which will usually go away on its own after affecting the first few tomatoes. By and large, its a self-correcting condition and it/s a common occurrence in many gardens.

Not much you can do about this year -- in spite of all suggestions to the contrary, such as adding lime, eggs shells or epsom salts, etc -- it other than to amend your soil with compost/organic matter, correct its pH, and try to maintain even soil moisture.

[EV]

Hey Holly, everyone agrees it's blossom end rot. I've had it on some plants some years. Then I read, and I think it was in this group, that if you push a calcium vitamin pill into the ground when you plant out, you can prevent the problem. I've been doing it for the past two growing seasons, one 300 mg pill per plant, and so far, it seems to be working.

EV

[mycroftt]

I have found that Roma's are particularly sensitive to blossom-end rot.

's lots of other paste tomato seeds available. Check out the above site - they even have San Marzano's!

[simy1]

San Marzano are no less sensitive than Roma. It's just the type (paste) which is like that. Incidentally, I never exeprienced BER, and I used to grow Roma in compost beds. This summer I have a new garden in sandy soil which I have not had a chance to improve yet, and I grow San Marzano and five other varieties. What do you know? Some San Marzano did get BER, none of the other tomatoes did.

[Steve Calvin]

You wouldn't happen to remember what tab the San's were under would ya? I couldn't find 'em under the tomato sections and they don't have a search tab...

[zxcvbob]

They were on the page linked above, about the 5th variety down the page.

Bob

[Steve Calvin]

Thanks Bob and a big "DDDUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHH" from this end. Guess it's time for that yearly eye exam...