Hello from Texas

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Wildcat82
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Joined: Tue Aug 31, 2021 8:34 am
Location: San Antonio Texas

Hello from Texas

#1

Post: # 53668Unread post Wildcat82
Fri Sep 10, 2021 4:34 pm

Hello everyone!. I grew up on a farm in the upper midwest. We had a monster sized garden there and raised tons of tomatoes. However, since moving to San Antonio, I have been absolutely plagued by tomato diseases with total wipeouts most years. Hopefully I can get some inputs from the experienced gardeners here, particularly the Texas gardeners. I'm always experimenting with different plants, techniques, etc. I look forward to talking to others who love gardening as much as I do.

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Whwoz
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Joined: Wed Dec 11, 2019 12:08 am
Location: Trafalgar, Victoria, Australia

Re: Hello from Texas

#2

Post: # 53669Unread post Whwoz
Fri Sep 10, 2021 5:40 pm

Welcome to the Junction from Down Under @Wildcat82.

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MissS
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Joined: Fri Dec 13, 2019 4:55 am
Location: SE Wisconsin Zone 5b

Re: Hello from Texas

#3

Post: # 53671Unread post MissS
Fri Sep 10, 2021 8:07 pm

Welcome @Wildcat82 I'm so glad that you found us here. It has been a tough year for many people this year. We have lots of experienced growere and Texans here that will be happy to help you.
~ Patti ~

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Amateurinawe
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Joined: Wed Jul 08, 2020 1:11 am
Location: Emsworth UK

Re: Hello from Texas

#4

Post: # 53675Unread post Amateurinawe
Sat Sep 11, 2021 1:47 am

Welcome @Wildcat82 from the uk!
The behaviour of light means you observe me as i was then, and not as I am now.
I cannot change history, so I do hope i gave you a good impression of myself

Lotte
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Joined: Wed Dec 11, 2019 7:58 am
Location: Denmark

Re: Hello from Texas

#5

Post: # 53676Unread post Lotte
Sat Sep 11, 2021 5:16 am

Welcome and hi from Denmark.

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karstopography
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Joined: Thu Apr 16, 2020 7:15 am
Location: Southeast Texas

Re: Hello from Texas

#6

Post: # 53679Unread post karstopography
Sat Sep 11, 2021 9:04 am

Welcome @Wildcat82 . Another Texan here. Wish I had a silver bullet for your maters. I had a pretty disease free and good tomato season which I chalked down to the massive prolonged February freeze maybe clearing many of the soil based pathogens. If the freeze would only frozen the squirrels I’d really be golden.

Timing, improving soil structure and health, nutrients, etc. that’s the things I think about to help the tomatoes. Mulching in a big way I believe helps tremendously here to control the radical moisture and temperature swings that our lower latitude intense sunlight can cause. Tomatoes don’t like their feet to get cooked or steamed and that’s what happens in Texas after a big rain and then the sun comes out and it’s 90 plus degrees when there’s no mulch. Mulching I believe has really helped my tomato plants thrive maybe more than anything else. I got lucky this year as the big freeze defoliated my bamboo stands and those abundant leaves made for the most excellent free mulch.

My buddy nearby grew the most amazing beautiful tomatoes this season and had even notoriously difficult Pink Brandywine produce well so it is possible to prevail in 29-30 degrees north latitude like what San Antonio is. He grows in raised beds like I do and really tries to control the moisture inputs and works to ensure the soil drains and percolates well. I believe much of the San Antonio area has heavy clay so if that’s true working in a lot of organic matter and elevating some, adding some good compost might really lighten that soil up in a good way.

Maybe you do all these things and more and something else is at work causing the disease issues. I’m doing a solarization treatment currently for my raised beds that’s about to be concluded. Clear sheet plastic over moist, weed free soil. The intense Sun heats up the soil to lethal to pathogens levels. I’m going after nematodes, but solarization is supposed to help with fungal and bacterial diseases as well.

Anyway, lots of experience here on TJ and maybe some other Texas tomato growers will chime in with their two cents. I did know gardeners in Massachusetts when I lived there that grew beautiful tomatoes, but the disease pressures are so much different there. The soil is very different there too. The intensity of the light. Maybe the seasons get nipped short at either end at times by cold weather, but it seemed like the middle was a clean, disease free, not fighting negative pressures so much. Our season here is more see-saw with building heat pressures as things progress.
Zone 9b, located in the Columbia bottomlands, annual rainfall 46”

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Wildcat82
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Joined: Tue Aug 31, 2021 8:34 am
Location: San Antonio Texas

Re: Hello from Texas

#7

Post: # 53682Unread post Wildcat82
Sat Sep 11, 2021 9:45 am

karstopography wrote: Sat Sep 11, 2021 9:04 am Welcome @Wildcat82 . Another Texan here. Wish I had a silver bullet for your maters. I had a pretty disease free and good tomato season which I chalked down to the massive prolonged February freeze maybe clearing many of the soil based pathogens. If the freeze would only frozen the squirrels I’d really be golden.

Timing, improving soil structure and health, nutrients, etc. that’s the things I think about to help the tomatoes. Mulching in a big way I believe helps tremendously here to control the radical moisture and temperature swings that our lower latitude intense sunlight can cause. Tomatoes don’t like their feet to get cooked or steamed and that’s what happens in Texas after a big rain and then the sun comes out and it’s 90 plus degrees when there’s no mulch. Mulching I believe has really helped my tomato plants thrive maybe more than anything else. I got lucky this year as the big freeze defoliated my bamboo stands and those abundant leaves made for the most excellent free mulch.

My buddy nearby grew the most amazing beautiful tomatoes this season and had even notoriously difficult Pink Brandywine produce well so it is possible to prevail in 29-30 degrees north latitude like what San Antonio is. He grows in raised beds like I do and really tries to control the moisture inputs and works to ensure the soil drains and percolates well. I believe much of the San Antonio area has heavy clay so if that’s true working in a lot of organic matter and elevating some, adding some good compost might really lighten that soil up in a good way.

Maybe you do all these things and more and something else is at work causing the disease issues. I’m doing a solarization treatment currently for my raised beds that’s about to be concluded. Clear sheet plastic over moist, weed free soil. The intense Sun heats up the soil to lethal to pathogens levels. I’m going after nematodes, but solarization is supposed to help with fungal and bacterial diseases as well.

Anyway, lots of experience here on TJ and maybe some other Texas tomato growers will chime in with their two cents. I did know gardeners in Massachusetts when I lived there that grew beautiful tomatoes, but the disease pressures are so much different there. The soil is very different there too. The intensity of the light. Maybe the seasons get nipped short at either end at times by cold weather, but it seemed like the middle was a clean, disease free, not fighting negative pressures so much. Our season here is more see-saw with building heat pressures as things progress.
It certainly is an uphill climb to grow anything here. I have the awful Texas Blackland Clay in my backyard. As an experiment at our new house 2 years ago, I planted some corn directly into the native soil just to see what it would do. Corn grew 1 foot tall then tried to tassel out - Hilarious. The intense heat and humidity make it hard to grow anything except okra and peppers between June and October

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Julianna
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Location: Monterey Bay, CA

Re: Hello from Texas

#8

Post: # 53686Unread post Julianna
Sat Sep 11, 2021 10:31 am

Welcome from Monterey Bay!
-julianna
10a Monterey Bay
Lover of Fogust, tomatoes, flowers, and pumpkins

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pepperhead212
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Joined: Mon Jan 20, 2020 12:07 am
Location: Woodbury, NJ

Re: Hello from Texas

#9

Post: # 53691Unread post pepperhead212
Sat Sep 11, 2021 12:14 pm

Welcome to the forum!
Woodbury, NJ zone 7a/7b

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karstopography
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Joined: Thu Apr 16, 2020 7:15 am
Location: Southeast Texas

Re: Hello from Texas

#10

Post: # 53694Unread post karstopography
Sat Sep 11, 2021 2:31 pm

@Wildcat82 that Blackland Clay is known to be very fertile, but it is also very dense and expansive when wet and shrinks terribly when dry. We have similar stuff on the coast. Takes a lot of mature compost to make it workable and that clay has a short window to work, too wet and it compacts even more severely and too dry, it’s rock hard. Don’t add sand as that makes it like concrete.

Timing is I think key on getting plants in. A lot of people tend to wait too far into the spring and you lose most of the best tomato setting weather. I want my plants up pretty tall and blooming well in April into Mid May. Some folks aren’t putting out sets here until April, that’s far too late for South Texas.

Things grow well here and in that soil, you just have to adjust timing and some of the other horticultural practices away from what you did up north.
Zone 9b, located in the Columbia bottomlands, annual rainfall 46”

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worth1
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Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2019 12:32 pm
Location: 25 miles southeast of Waterloo Texas

Re: Hello from Texas

#11

Post: # 53702Unread post worth1
Sat Sep 11, 2021 4:32 pm

Welcome Texan.
Worth
25 miles southeast of Waterloo Texas.

You can't argue with a closed mind.
You might as well be arguing with a cat.

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AZGardener
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Joined: Wed Dec 11, 2019 9:12 am
Location: Arizona, USA

Re: Hello from Texas

#12

Post: # 54024Unread post AZGardener
Sat Sep 18, 2021 8:05 am

Welcome to the Junction!
USDA Zone 9b, Sunset Zone 13
Average Rainfall 9.5 inches
Climate: Sonoran Desert

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TXTravis
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Joined: Tue Jun 09, 2020 4:21 pm
Location: Round Rock, TX
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Re: Hello from Texas

#13

Post: # 54347Unread post TXTravis
Tue Sep 21, 2021 4:24 pm

Welcome. I'm north of Austin myself. Keys for me seem to be getting them in early, which for me means at least 2 weeks before average last frost, and usually even sooner. This year I put them in a week after the big freeze and was fine, but you have to be prepared to lose everything and plant again. They need that head start to beat the heat. That said, I have a few stragglers that are still producing a few weak tomatoes, even as hot as it's been. Early blight is always a problem, but mulch helps with that and with temp/moisture regulation. There are a handful of heat resistant varieties that are good, but in my experience spidermites are a bigger late season threat than heat. And though this year was relatively cool and wet and the plants produced longer and spider mites weren't as bad, the aphids were worse and so was the fungal wilt. I still had plenty, but didn't have as many to give away.
A seed not planted is guaranteed not to grow.

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Harry Cabluck
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Joined: Fri Dec 11, 2020 8:40 pm
Location: Austin, Texas

Re: Hello from Texas

#14

Post: # 58250Unread post Harry Cabluck
Sun Nov 28, 2021 11:10 am

Yo! Wildcat 82. There's spent mushroom compost for sale at a growing facility around Gonzales, Texas. If you wish to amend your soil quickly. Good reference book by William D. Adams is "The Texas Tomato Lover's Handbook." If you are able to spend the time, you might attempt to graft your favorite varieties onto hardy rootstock.
Refrain from calculating the total number of poultry...before the process of incubation has fully materialized.

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Nan6b
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Joined: Tue Dec 10, 2019 2:58 pm
Location: Pittsburgh, PA

Re: Hello from Texas

#15

Post: # 58262Unread post Nan6b
Sun Nov 28, 2021 4:37 pm

Welcome from Pittsburgh!

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Shule
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Location: SW Idaho, USA

Re: Hello from Texas

#16

Post: # 58341Unread post Shule
Mon Nov 29, 2021 6:35 pm

Welcome, @Wildcat82!
🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅🍅
Location: SW Idaho, USA
Climate: BSk
USDA hardiness zone: 6
Elevation: 2,260 feet

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