(bright music) - Welcome to "Digging Deeper with Backyard Farmer".

I'm your host, Kim Todd, and on "Digging Deeper", we have in-depth discussions with extension and industry experts about those important landscape topics.

Tonight, we're talking tomatoes with John Porter.

He's pretty much an expert in growing them and do you like them, John?

Do you eat them or do you just grow them and give them?

- Grow them (laughs).

I can them and cook them.

- Can, cook and not slice and dice.

- Mm-hmm, no, no, but shh.

Don't tell anyone.

- But don't tell anyone.

- Because how do you know to grow them if you don't eat them, right?

- Right.

- Right.

Well, part of the reason, John, that I thought we should talk tomatoes again is because on "Backyard Farmer," we have gotten question after question after question about what's wrong with my tomatoes?

And we've had such strange weather, you know, hot, cold, wet, dry, all those good things.

So, let's start with what you've brought and sort of differentiate between what it's supposed to look like, what it isn't supposed to look like and what happened.

- Right.

So, we get so many tomato questions because, number one, tomatoes are the number one popular thing that people grow in their vegetable garden.

And it's usually sort of like the gateway vegetable into the garden, right?

You know, you get a tomato and you plant it in the flower bed or in a pot.

And then the next year you have six tomatoes and then the following year, you add cucumbers and beans and then you keep going from there.

And so, we have lots and lots of tomatoes, and unfortunately we're seeing lots and lots of problems with those tomatoes.

And it sort of is because we plant our tomatoes right around the same time that especially in areas close to, say, cornfields and soybean fields, were applying herbicides.

But we can also get it from things like using an herbicide in our own landscape or the neighbors or spraying the rider way and that's herbicide drift damage.

And so, we have tomatoes that look sorta normal here.

We see a little browning there, they've dried out a little bit, but you see that the leaves are kind of normal.

They're flat, the leaves should be flat.

You should be able to sort of make them flat.

We'll talk a little bit, these are curling a little bit and we'll talk a little bit about what that means in a minute, that's a different problem.

But a normal tomato leaf.

We got this one in at the office and you can see how weird, once we get a closeup, how weird this tomato plant really looks along the top.

And we see all of this weird curling and cupping of the leaves and it's really, really an interesting kind of damage.

This is herbicide damage and you can get that kind of damage either from drift.

So, if someone sprays an herbicide, if you're doing something on the lawn, on the rider way or if a farmer is spraying it and the weather conditions are right, you can get that volatilization and the drift will come into your garden and hit the tomatoes and it will do that kind of damage.

And for some herbicides, they can actually drift for two to three or even more miles under the right condition.

So you might say, well, I live nowhere near a farm that would be using this.

Like, we get it right in the interior of Omaha, we get people calling all the time about this and if you think about it, yes, Omaha is a big city, but on the edge of the city all the way around, we have lots of farms that are using that and we plant tomatoes right about the same time that they're spraying that.

- Well and also lawn care.

People are so concerned about broadleaf weeds in their lawns.

I mean, we live right in the middle of Lincoln and same thing.

Not this severe, this almost looks like a direct hit.

- Yeah, so this is and you making a good point.

So, it's not always like farm fields, we're not gonna always blame that.

It could be yard application in the neighborhood.

Things like Dicamba which is one of the chemicals that we see a lot of this damage from, really if it's over 85 degrees and more than a few miles per hour of wind, that's when you get the drift and it can go for miles and miles.

This actually is a direct hit.

So, the gentleman that brought this told us that he used grass clippings as mulch on his garden.

And he had used an herbicide treatment on the grass.

And so, it was still a residual.

So, he basically directly apply it.

And you can actually see if I were to, you know, I've got roots and all and you can actually see it's full of grass clippings.

- That are full of whatever the herbicide.

- That are full of whatever herbicide he used and I asked him and he didn't know.

So, we have that kinda damage.

And so, the question is, okay, well, will it recover?

It's always the question, will it recover?

- Can you cut it back?

When do you make the decision to start over?

- Right.

We see this damage most commonly in tomatoes, this herbicide drift, they're very vulnerable.

You can get it in other plants in the landscape.

Tomatoes are most vulnerable.

The other edible crop that's also vulnerable, but most people don't have it at home anymore is grapes.

- [Kim] Oh, absolutely.

Peppers.

- Winery and peppers will get it because they're related.

So, you might see it on potatoes as well.

So, a lot of plants will recover.

So, you can see a little closer there, that's a different, you can see that curling there on the picture there.

So, that is herbicide drift.

So, we see that and the actual...

I guess I'm gonna pronounce this right and you can correct me if I'm wrong, I think people pronounce it all different ways, but it's a penalty or epinasty or epinasty.

And so, that happens.

What happens is the herbicide makes the top of the leaf grow faster than the bottom of the leaf and it does that curling.

You can also get hyponasty, which is the opposite direction of curling and you get that as a response.

So the question is, can I save this?

And if the damage isn't too bad, you could, but we kinda recommend against that because we don't know the safety of the herbicide that's been applied to this plant.

Is it safe for you to actually consume?

Because number one, you're likely not even going to know what the product is, if it's drift.

And then, number two, usually herbicides aren't labeled for use directly on edible crops because you want the plant to live, you're not killing the plant.

And so usually, they're not tested for safety on edible crops.

- [Kim] That's good point, yeah.

- So, it's really sad to tell people this.

I tell people that the best course of action would be, if possible, to actually remove the plant and replant it if you can.

- So in this case, John, if he has mulched with the grass clippings that have the herbicide in them, and we've heard this also for years, and he pulls the plant or the plants and gets most of the grass clippings, would he expect still some damage from the residual in the grass clippings or does he have to figure out how to get all the grass clippings?

- If the concentration is high enough, he still could.

It depends on like how much is actually in the grass clippings.

And so, there could be, if there's not a lot, but he had a lot of grass clippings he was using as mulch, then you would see the damage.

Maybe it's a lower concentration per grass blade.

And so, he might not see the damage.

And so, he did take my advice and I told him to remove these and he did and he removed as much of the mulch as he could and he replanted.

And so, we'll cross our fingers.

- This is sort of cupping or almost clubbing.

What about shoe-stringing?

I mean, when the vein shoe-string, is that also a herbicide?

- Yeah, we'll see that too.

So, I call it sort of like strappy.

So, it sort of looks like the veins are all, like the vein, it actually has weird looking veins in it.

Even on here, we can see the normal veins is sort of like that, you know- - [Kim] Like the netted.

- The netted type of veins and then you'll actually see them almost go like a parallel vein where they're all going in the same, usually random direction.

So, you'll see that as well.

All those are signs and really, it could depend on like the concentration of herbicide or which herbicide.

The two most common ones that do damage like this are Dicamba and 2,4-d. You can also get glyphosate damage, which is more commonly used, but that's a little easier to see because it's usually white spots, like whitish dead spots.

And if it's drift, it's usually like on the interior of the plant.

- Interesting, all right, good.

Well, so, do we have pictures of the shoe-stringing or do you have other pictures that you want them to load- - I thought there was another picture, I don't know how easily it shows up.

You can sort of see it on the top leaf there a little bit that you can see some of that weird damage, but if you look at the leaf, you'll know like that leaf is- - Just not right.

- Just not right.

And like I said, you should be able to, like a normal leaf, you should be able to lay it out flat.

So, this leaf is not damaged, I can still lay it out flat.

These, there's no way I can get- - [Kim] Leaf tissue.

- Leaf tissue to lay out flat there.

They're totally growing that way.

It's not just cupping after the fact, that's the way the leaf is growing.

- Wow, that's interesting.

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Okay, John, so the other one that I know we've talked about is curly top.

- Right, curly top is a viral disease and it's one of those that, you know, it can be hard to differentiate between these.

- Right, right and that one really...

I mean that, again, it's a virus and off with its head.

- Right, yeah.

You've basically gotta remove it.

So, if it's got that weird growth that doesn't look like it's just a regular leaf, that's curled up and we'll talk about what that can mean in a minute, if the leaf is actually growing weird, it's either herbicide drift or curly top and it's gotta go.

- Okay, all right.

So, let's talk about the rest of it then, all those other things you wanna talk about- - All those other things and I have a good picture to show this.

So, I think we've had some hot weather (laughs).

- Yeah, some hot weather.

- Some hot weather.

And so we get some curling.

And so you see this picture right here, that nice, big green tomato and you see that leaf rolling right there.

So, that is a regular leaf that's rolling up, it's not growing that way.

You could flatten it out if you wanted to.

That's actually a heat response.

What that leaf is trying to do is trying to reduce its surface area so that it's not evaporating out as much moisture.

And so, that's a way that the plant is trying to conserve water.

And so, you'll see that rolling up.

And it's usually a rolling up so that the leave is like curling in on itself.

So, that is a heat response.

And you wanna make sure the plant is well-watered, but they will still do it even if they have enough water and it's really hot, you will still see that 'cause it's trying to maintain the water that is internal to the plant because if it gets over a hundred degrees, the plant could actually like be losing more water than it can take up almost.

- Right, well, and I think people also have to be a little careful, don't they?

That they don't water so much when it's doing that, that they're causing super saturation of the roots.

But you mentioned temperature, what else does temperature do to tomatoes that damages our ability to pluck them and taste them?

- Right, so I have another picture here and it actually can kill the flowers.

It actually denatures pollen.

And so, we can get that happening when temperatures get over 85.

And so like, when in that?

Most of the summer.

And so, we can actually see, you think, if you cook like my father cooks, you go into the kitchen and you turn the dial as hot as it goes and you think dinner is gonna get done fast, right?

That's how my dad cooks and my mom talks about it all the time.

And you end up burning dinner and you lose dinner.

Well, if you, you think, oh, the hotter it is, the faster it's gonna grow.

But once you get to a certain point, it's actually so hot that it denatures the pollen and it actually kills the flower.

And so, it actually slows down production when it gets too hot.

And so, what can you do?

Like you can't control the weather.

You could maybe use a shade cloth or something like that.

- Right, but not much, especially not if we're breaking records all over the place.

- Yeah, if you're breaking records, if we're 105 degrees, which I think Omaha was.

And so, when you get to that hot, there's really not a lot that you can do.

Now, it's really interesting that you said don't over-water and actually curling leaves is a symptom of over-watering which is weird, it's sort of like- - Both.

- Both, like, it's all the above.

So, usually that curling is typically curling under versus curling up and cupping itself.

But you will see that.

So, if you see that, you definitely wanna stop watering.

Check your drainage if it's like rain.

I actually just got a question sent to me from one of our colleagues who got this question from a client saying my tomato and pepper leaves are curling like this and it happened right after a big rain and it continues every time, like we keep seeing it.

And it's water, not heat.

So, it's weird.

Tomatoes, peppers, plants are weird, right?

You just gotta figure them out.

- Right and especially, every year they come out with either new varieties or there's a huge influx now of the heirlooms, people wanting to go back to the fabulous taste of an heirloom tomato as opposed to the varieties that produce a lot of tomatoes and they ship well, they just don't have that tomato flavor.

Well, one of the issues I think with heirlooms is disease resistance or lack thereof, right?

- Right, so most heirlooms don't have disease resistance.

Also, I don't know that we're doing it as much with garden vegetables, but other plants, we're also trying to breed them for weather and temperature extremes.

And so, those will probably be coming out if we think about it.

At some point, we will have to have plants that can withstand temperature extremes that we don't have right now.

- Exactly, exactly.

Well, and heirlooms too, I mean, people always ask the question, do you pinch?

Are they determinant?

Are they indeterminant?

Do you take off the suckers?

Those kinds of management practices.

Do those have really much, if anything, to do with tomato health or is it a matter of preference?

- Usually it's a matter of preference, though with the indeterminate tomatoes, they're the vining and they'll grow everywhere.

And if you let them get too big and bushy, the number one, you reduce the airflow.

And so, you can get more disease issues with that.

And then number two, if you have this giant plant that keeps growing and you don't have a lot of support for it, then it'll fall over.

Also, if you're producing too many fruits on it, then you could be sacrificing quality of some for others.

And really, it's about a space management thing.

So, you get those suckers that grow out.

You can keep it nice and pruned and clean and even and that will help you manage it better.

- You know, and there's also, John, a lot of interest in patio versions or container versions or grow-in-a-bag versions.

Are you seeing any either pros or cons or really interesting issues associated with that method?

- We are seeing a lot of those.

We have several that are, you know, we do the All-America selections trials and Backyard Farmer garden is the demonstration.

We have a few that were winners.

Like we have the patio choice yellow, we have several of those growing at our office now.

Even with peppers, we're growing the Pot-a-peno, which was a winner last year.

- [Kim] What a name.

- Pot-a-peno, right?

And so, I think there's a lot of interest there because maybe you don't have a garden and you know we had 16 million new gardeners in the country last year and probably even more this year and people, they wanna grow where they are.

And so, if that's inside, if that's on the balcony, if that's a pot on the front stoop, you can't really put like a big boy tomato in a two gallon pot on the stoop and maintain it.

- Right, or one of those indeterminants that you basically need to stake to a tree and then get a ladder out.

So, people need to choose wisely.

And if you've already got one of those, make sure that you're doing the pinching or the pruning.

Are there issues, do you see more or less disease with patio-type tomatoes or is it a little hard to tell?

- It's a little hard to tell though.

Usually they're not out in the soil, which we can overwinter a lot of diseases and they splash up or we're not planting them as heavily.

Like in a garden or in a field, we might have tomatoes that are 18 inches apart, whereas each individual pot is separate and they're a little farther spaced.

And most of those are new varieties that have disease resistance bred in.

And so, I think we're seeing that and I think disease resistance is gonna be like the big thing that we're looking at.

And then also for environmental resistance, I think that's gonna be one of the new things that's coming up as well.

- Right, well and I think just to add to that real quickly, one of the things that we tell people about container-growing in general is you have to change that soil.

- You definitely have to.

- So, I need to rotate.

If you're gonna grow tomatoes in the same container every single year on your porch or your patio or your deck, that's actually probably worse than not having enough space in your garden, yes?

- Exactly.

'Cause we don't think, you know, most of those potting mixes are soilless mixes and if you're growing in the ground, you have like an unlimited supply of nutrients like the micronutrients that they don't use a lot of and you're not usually adding lots of nutrients.

So, you're depleting those micronutrients from the potting mix.

It's also usually like peat moss or coconut core-based, which actually breaks down because it's an undecomposed organic material.

So, it will actually break down over time.

And so, you actually do need to be adding new stuff or replacing stuff for diseases.

So, there's lots of different things, like lots of weird things that you have to think about when you're growing tomatoes or anything else.

- So, tomatoes are a weed, but for our viewers, they're a weed that still needs a little bit of attention.

That is all the time we do have for "Digging Deeper with Backyard Farmer."

We wanna say thanks to John for coming in and talking to us.

We will be back next time with another in-depth discussion.

Do be sure to watch "Backyard Farmer" live every Thursday 7:00 PM central on Nebraska Public Media.

Thanks for digging deeper with "Backyard Farmer."

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