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| So this is my first garden, I am using 100% organic methods. I live in Brooklyn and have a raised bed. I have three tomato plants, two sweet-100s and a sungold. They are now 6-7 feet tall and loaded with fruit that is just starting to ripen, also tons of flowers. I've recently started to notice some lower leaves covered with small spots. And on the underside of those leaves I found some tiny black bugs with wings -- the bugs flew away when disturbed. Not sure what type of leaf problem I have exactly or whether the bugs are causing the damage -- but what should I do to correct it? I don't care if leaves get a little scruffy looking but I don't want problems to affect my fruit! Should I be pruning off all the damaged leaves? |
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| I would remove the leaves. Sounds like Early Blight to me. Bugs may be aphids...spray 'em off. |
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| It's a bit of a reach to make a disease diagnosis without images. Any chance of posting some? |
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| It is difficult to make a disease diagnosis even with good pictures. Without pictures it will be just a guessing game. JMO |
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| If you do nothing else remove the damaged leaves. Nothing is gained by leaving them on the plant. Lots of pics of aphids on the web you can browse to see if that is the bug you see. Then act accordingly. Dave |
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- Posted by westminstress (My Page) on Wed, Jul 16, 14 at 11:32
| I will try to take a photo and post. I've been unable to take pictures the last couple of days because it's been raining. I'm confused by the bugs -- mostly I read to knock the aphids off with a blast from the hose -- this seems to make sense with normal aphids but does it work for flying ones? And also seems to conflict with advice not to wet the leaves in order to curb spread of fungal diseases. Any advice on this one? |
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| Gardening is a balance. Nothing directly conflicts with anything else in reality. It is all in the timing and the context :). Sure you don't want to wet leaves anymore than is necessary - so avoid doing the watering with an overhead sprinkler when possible. But the rain has already wet the leaves. So hitting some aphids with a water hose isn't going to make any difference, right? Had it not been raining then blasting the aphids with the hose early in the day when the leaves have plenty of time to dry out - no problem. Ok? And yes it works on winged ones too as it destroys their wings. Dave |
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