On Thursday evening I noticed that the few, small green tomatoes had developed slightly darkened areas containing a few blackish spots (at their stigma end). Please see the attached photo.

What is this? Blossom end rot?

BTW, it's my first time growing tomatoes and posting on this forum :)

Daytime indoors ambient temp is about 23c and the nutrient solution is 20c. Humidity is in the 70s.

I'm using a liquid nutrient, Hyponex High Grade 7-10-6 mixed 2ml per litre. The wick system was flushed and 2 1/3 litres of new solution was added on 4th Dec and this was topped up with 1 1/3 litres of cooled, filtered and boiled tap water (pH 6) on Tuesday 11th Dec. I had intended to flush and refill the system sometime next week.

I haven't checked the pH of the current nutrient solution.

Any ideas what's wrong and what can I do to fix the problem would be greatly appreciated!

Cheers,
Scrumpy :)

I hadn't realised how thirsty my tomato plants had become now that they are developing fruit but this evening I found that the nutrient solution in the reservoir had dropped to a depth of less than 2cm!

This is surely the reason why the tomatoes have taken a turn for the worse in the past few days. Drinking from the remaining solution which has been depleted of certain nutrients but has a higher ratio of others can't be good.

Another lesson learnt - Pay regular attention to the level of the nutrient solution.

I have two other mini roma plants that haven't yet fruited so hopefully I will be able to harvest some tomatoes from them.

The question is now, what to do with the existing tomatoes that have some signs of blossom end rot?

Do (the collective) you recommend I remove them or let them continue to grow as the damage is not severe or extensive?

I will do a web search and see what I can find on this subject but it would be nice if someone more experienced on this matter could respond.

Scrumpy :)

I removed the affected tomatoes as I read that once they have blossom end rot there's no saving them. I also flushed the system and added 4 litres of fresh nutrient solution.

At this time, tomatoes that are developing on a second plant look okay as well as a new one on the first plant.

I'm keeping a closer eye on the level of the solution and I'll also check it's pH more often.

As the remaining tomatoes reach maturity I'll make another post which will hopefully conclude this thread.

Scrumpy :)

A few toms were lost to BER on the 2nd and 3rd plants before I found a solution which worked for me.

The nutrient solution now gets completely changed once a week. A day or two over is ok but any longer and BER is a risk.

I downsized the reservoir now that there's only two mini roma tomato plants and fill it with 2.5L of nutrient solution (was 3L) on each change.

I've harvested only three toms from the 2nd plant due to BER and earlier, over zealous pruning but the 3rd plant has a nice truss of ripening mini romas.

Romas (aka plum) tomatoes are best eaten after being cooked. That's why they're popular in sauces.

I've also been growing an indeterminate variety of cherry toms which haven't suffered from BER and taste good raw.

For the next crop of indoor toms I'll just grow cherry varities as I prefer eating raw toms and they're easier to grow i.e. you can leave them for two weeks and not worry.

Hopefully this little saga will be read by other new roma tomato growers and it might help them.

Cheers,
Scrumpy :)