Strange leaf sprouts

[zendog]

Every year my maters show me some new type of growth that surprises me. Fasciated stems, flower shoots that turn into suckers... I thought I'd seen it all. This year some of the leaves on my Eva Ste. Wendell is sending shoots out along the main rib of some of the leaves. I've had some plants that look like they may have viral issues or possibly herbicide drift from someone a few plots over who sprayed some roundup. Is this something folks accept as normal or something I should be worried about?

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[MissS]

I have never seen this before either. However, due to the fact that that new misshapen growth is also discolored, I think that this may be a chemical disorder. How are the rest of the leaves on this plant?

[bower]

Wow... that's a new one on me!

[Shule]

So, what are you going to do with that leaf? Wow. I wonder what chemical or conditions caused it. Or, it could be a mutation.

[zendog]

I went back and looked closely and saw a similar thing going on with the Pale Perfect Purple right beside the Eva Ste. Wendell plant. In each case, the affected leaves are about halfway up a 3-foot high single stem plant. I'm in a community plot and have a fair number of plants showing some twisty leaves, etc. and I'm inclined to believe it is all related to the person spraying roundup in their plot about 30 feet away from mine.

But I can't really say for sure. If that isn't it, I have a lot of plants with some type of virus or another issue. They are all still growing and forming fruit, so I'm hoping they'll survive and I'll still get a decent harvest, but I'd like to figure this out to avoid it next year.

[jmsieglaff]

Symptoms, two plants next to each other and known RoundUp application—highly likely that’s what it is. It doesn’t look too bad, if your growth tips look fine and fruits are still setting, you’ll likely be OK. Maybe remove impacted foliage and a have a polite conversation quickly. Maybe the person can use the foaming option instead of mist spraying?

[jmsieglaff]

Also you have the start of what looks like Septoria leaf spot. The leaves behind the oddball have small dark circles with light centers. Leaves with those should be removed and disposed of in the trash. I would inspect all plants—it will continue it spread. It is such an annoying fungal issue.

[zendog]

Thanks all. Sounds like the consensus is it must be herbicidal drift since nobody has seen this from some type of nutrient issue, etc. Ugh. I have already pulled a few plants that were really curly and disfigured at the tops, but the rest look okay except for some more curly leaves and these mutations on the two. I'm hoping they live through it, or at least live with it, since I'd hate to loose more plants. These are all plants I grafted, etc. so a lot of work and of course you all know what it is like to loose a season.

Thanks for pointing out the spotting as possibly Septoria. I live in a hot, humid area and it is a constant battle with disease. I grow my plants single stem to get them up and away from the soil, but it is always a race against removing leaves that get some type of disease and having enough left to keep the plant going. I've found the extra vigor from the rootstock I'm using helps with that.

If anyone else thinks it might be something other than chemical damage, please weigh in. I'm going to talk to the chief gardner for the gardens and ask about making sure people don't spray roundup. People hate weeds and want to do the easy thing, but the gardens are all too close together.

[MissS]

I garden at a community garden as well and we have a rule that forbids Roundup and other weed killers. It sure is a pain for me because my plot wasn't actively gardened for 2 years but it sure makes sense so that we don't harm one another's plants with the drift. Perhaps you should let the management know what happened as well as the person that used this product. My guess is that the person did not even think about the consequences of doing this to other's plants. It's a good rule for a community plot to have.

[Amateurinawe]

Got something similar on the long Tom tomato. It is a wispy foliage plant and right amongst all the other tomato plants. In my case I doubt it is chemicals as others would be affected, but odd all the same.

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[Growing Coastal]

I have seen very small similar leaf sprouts along leaf veins but never so much as what is in the OP.

[Shule]

[mention]Amateurinawe[/mention]
Is yours a grafted plant, by chance? I wonder if herbicide might more reliably do this to grafted plants, and maybe that's why it seems so rare.

[Growing Coastal]

I took a close look today at one plant that is doing this here, too. It is the same thing that happened to this variety, Black Yum Yum, last year though not as bad as last year and not as bad as yours, Zendog.
It's a reaction to something but pegging that down is not easy. I suspected the nearest neighbour as the breeze comes in that way so I moved the plant further away from that spot. Nothing else, in the way of trees or shrubs is affected and another neighbour doesn't think spray was used.
Then I guessed perhaps I had double-dosed with fertilizer last year.
None of my other plants has this curling and extra sprouts going on.
They all have curly leaves but none like this one which has its higher leaves curling in around toward themselves, especially on the shady side of the plant. I noticed too that many leaves were touching and too dense so I trimmed. (PM! prevention)
The other varieties except the anthos also have their top leaves curling but they grow out if it nicely.
When the curly leaves happened last year I thought it was simply due to our Juneuary weather with too many too cold nights which was only worse this year. Heat wave now....
This plant is sensitive to something and much more so than other varieties. Manure??? I dunno, yet.

Some pics
From the front, sunny side, some leaves are near normal.


Not a lot of sprouts like yours.

[mama_lor]

I have seen this quite a few times. Like always, people who prune to one stem are more likely to find odd things.
There is definitely a correlation between plant vigor and this abnormal growth. if you want insane stuff, grow Green Bee, prune to one stem. I should have taken pictures, the sprouts from the leaf were super dense and 10-15cm long, and kept coming after I cut them off, mostly from the lower leaves.

In all cases they were pale, definitely not a drift of any kind, this happens every year to some varieties, I think it's just a nutrient issue, the plant doesn't want to allocate sufficient nutrition to this growth, so they don't fully develop.

[zendog]

Thanks all for the additional information and shared experiences. The sprouts seem to have mostly stopped growing and are darkening to closer to the green of the rest of the leaves, so maybe it was something temporary. We have had some cooler days in June than normal so maybe that is doing something. [mention]Growing Coastal[/mention] I am seeing several plants with the curly growth like you show, even some potato leaf varieties.

In terms of fertilizing, I always cover crop over winter (winter peas and crimson clover with a little daikon as well), mix in a little bit of tomato tone (just a tablespoon or so) in the soil around the plant when planting out the seedlings and often give them a light fish emulsion dose a few days after watering. My thought is that the roots won't be out to where the tomato tone is yet and this gives them a little boost while they are settling in. After they were in for about a month, I applied Hyr Brix tomato fertilizer at about 1/2 the recommended amount, just scratching it in at the surface. Maybe it just got a little denser application near the plants showing the weird sprouts and curly growth and this had some impact? This is the first time using Hyr Brix.

I do feel that some of the growth issues that came before, with yellowing as well, were from herbacidal drift, but maybe I'm seeing multiple things going on. I'll try to remember to update here as the season goes on.

By the way, I'm also having a lot of peppers showing signs of mosaic viruses which I think leafhoppers are spreading, but I don't think that would be what is causing the growth issues in the tomatoes.

[zendog]

I thought the weird sprouts were coming down, but I see they are still growing. Here is a video showing weird growth along the row, including several with curly leaves and one that seemed to lose its terminal growth point. I definitely still need to cut off some diseased leaves, etc. but I wanted to get this video done before I took anything off.

[Growing Coastal]

This morning I see that the larger top leaves are curled on my other plants but that they soon grow normally.

Yes, ZD, please do let us know how things progress. I am surprised that stuff like roundup is allowed in a community garden at all. Too easy to have drift when plots are so close.

[zendog]

I am surprised that stuff like roundup is allowed in a community garden at all. Too easy to have drift when plots are so close.

I am surprised as well. There are rules about dates to have your garden cleaned up, to have started growing, requirements to keep it weeded, etc. but they neer seem to have gotten around to anything regarding chemicals. I will be bringing it up and trying to get an announcement made, but it isn't a very organized or regulated situation. I'll also talk, nicely, to the gardener who has sprayed, but he is almost never around, which is probably why the roundup approach appeals vs. doing actual weeding.

[Seven Bends]

The man in the community garden plot adjacent to mine sprayed Roundup along our shared fence last month, hitting one of my tomato plants and several potato plants in the process. The damage was exactly like this picture from Clemson, with distinctive bleaching/yellowing of the inner part of the leaves: https://hgic.clemson.edu/factsheet/glyp ... -tomatoes/. The plants then became severely stunted, and the damaged leaves curled up, browned and dropped off over the course of several weeks. This doesn't look like what you're seeing in your plot.

Are you sure it was Roundup that the other gardener sprayed, or could it have been a different herbicide? Other herbicides can cause weird curling and bizarre growth without discoloration. I haven't seen anything quite like what you have, though.

Did you use the new fertilizer on all the plants that are exhibiting these growth issues, and was it applied before these problems appeared? If so, I'd focus on that as a possible cause.

Maybe try the ask-an-extension-agent service, Virginia Cooperative Extension? You'll have to pick the location and VCE in the dropdown box. https://ask2.extension.org/open.php

I'm no expert, but it doesn't really look like something contagious at this point. Probably you can just wait it out and see what happens. The only viral thing that comes to my mind with those symptoms is curly top virus, and I don't think that's present around here, being a disease of arid areas, but I could be wrong about that.

[Growing Coastal]

The advice I got last year was to cut off any very weird growth. After I pruned that one bad plant it did sprout new, normal growth at leaf axils. I didn't prune soon enough to get any fruit though.