The Beer Garden: Tackling Tomato Issues (video)

The summer heat brings fruit, flowers and, unfortunately, common tomato issues like blight, end rot and cat-facing. Sam and Pippen describe a new way to confront tomato issues and explain why they occur.

The Beer Garden is a video series from Sam’s garden, where local beer is the only inorganic substance allowed. But, even the beer is organic sometimes! We started this series to spread the joy of gardening and show that inorganic chemicals should be a last resort to solving common garden problems.

If you’re interested in growing great tomatoes, check out our Tomato Growing Tips video.

Tips for avoiding tomato issues:

Choose disease resistant tomato varieties. Heirlooms may taste the best, but aren’t always the most disease resistant!
Rotate your crops! Change up where you plant tomatoes and other Solanaceous crops like potatoes, peppers and eggplants. Rotating crops improves the soil and prevents diseases from reoccurring year-to-year.
Water slow and deep on a regular basis with a soaker hose or drip line. Overhead watering leads to splashing and unhappy plants! Uneven watering (i.e., periods of drought followed by periods of excessive watering) leads to issues like cat-facing and end rot.
- Check out our video on how to tell if your veggies need water.
Use organic, slow release fertilize exactly as instructed on the packaging. When in doubt, use less fertilizer than suggested. Excessive nitrogen
Wait to plant your tomatoes outdoors until overnight temperatures are consistently above 50 degrees. Planting too soon provides no benefits, and exposes your tomatoes to diseases and pests!
Prune the suckers off of your indeterminate tomato plants to create better air flow and concentrate the plants’ energy on flowering and fruiting. (See how in our video.)

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