Leaves turning brown on tomato plants

I know that leaves start to turn and die from the bottom up as the life cycle of the tomato progresses. However, their are some that seem to be dying above a section of green leaves or just a couple die around other leaves. It seemed to start on one plant and has moved to others. I did spray twice for disease. Not sure if it did anything. Also everything has all but stopped producing. I just think if is so dang HOT here! But wonder if this is affecting things because it is killing leaves and sometimes the fruit sets are effected too and drop off... Any thoughts?

Do you have any photos? If you could post them that would give us a bit of a better idea of what suggestions to offer.

Most of my tomato plants are toast, especially those in Mel's mix -- August has just been so darned hot here. I really think in this area 5-1/2" of Mel's mix is not enough depth to hold moisture (and mine has reduced to about 4"). I've found in the past that if the tomato plants survive the August heat, even with copious brown areas, I usually get a good fall crop. My recommendation would be to fertilize well and keep watering them. At least that is what I am doing.

I did use dried grass clippings as a mulch under my tomatoes and I have noticed that the soil is noticeably cooler and more moist in the mulched parts.

I am going out this morning to tend to the garden some. I will try to take some pictures. This was my first SFG. I am undecided about SFG. There are some things I like and probably more I don't like.

It could be that your fertilize is actually competing with your tomato plants for moisture. Maybe you can focus on building up your compost blend, instead of using conventional fertilizer. Ferrtilizer is high in nitrogen, and actually complete with plants for moisture. Our family is a rice farming family, and we constantly have to time the fertilzer with rainfall. But, if you already have compost, fertilizer is not necessary. Just build up your compost for the next cycle. In the meantime, keep your SFG consistently watered. You should also check the topic under Wicking Boxes, to learn about automatically watering your plants. For plants like tomatoes that demand more water than other vegetables, a wicking box will save two or three trips a day of going to water your tomatoes. I hope this is useful. Let us know how it turns out.

Here is a link on composting, which I thoroughly enjoyed reading. http://compostinfo.com/main/intro.htm

davidclubb wrote:Here is a link on composting, which I thoroughly enjoyed reading. http://compostinfo.com/main/intro.htm

David:

Looks like good info. Thanks for the link.

God Bless, Ward and Mary.