Possible Curley Top Virus

[Shule]

You can get Rowpac, Roza, Saladmaster, and Payette at Sand Hill Preservation Center.

I have seeds of Payette that I saved in 2016 and 2017.

[svalli]

I agree with the possibility of herbicide injury causing those deformities. It has been increasing problem here and sadly affects those who want to grow organic. Many European commercial organic fertilizers and potting soils have been found to have residues of herbicides. I do not dare to buy any bagged soil, which lists compost as one of the ingredients and also I do not buy bagged manure or plant based fertilizers.
Swedish home gardeners association has studied the issue a lot and have written many reports about it. This one has photos, which shows the damage caused by pyralids to different plant families. It is in Swedish, but it has the plant family names in Latin.
/https://for.se/wp-content/uploads/2022/ ... 2_UN-1.pdf

Even organic community gardens are not safe from herbicides. Couple of years ago two community gardens in Stockholm had all the sensitive plants damaged, because at one they bought sheep manure from place, which had the sheep grazing on a sprayed pasture and other one used horse manure from a stable.

Edit:
Lower right corner of this web-page has links to two documents written in English.
https://for.se/pyralidaffaren/

[Cranraspberry]

I yanked my plant today and opened a separate topic. The curling got worse, the plant was about a foot shorter than everything else in that bed and some leaves started yellowing and developing spots.

IMG_9057.jpeg

[MissS]

@GoDawgs have you heard back from the extension service yet?

[GoDawgs]

I didn't hear anything back so called the Extension agent's office this Monday and they had no record of having received my e-mail even though my program said it was successfully sent. Go figure. Anyway, I talked with the agent and she asked me to resend the photos to her personal e-mail which I did while I was talking to her.

When I asked if UGA could do a soil analysis for herbicides, she said that UGA no longer does that. She does have the web addy of several companies that do testing and will send me those that particularly do tests for herbicides used on pastures. Haven't received that info yet.

While I was out in the garden this morning the agent called and asked if she could come look at the plants. But of course! She'll be here Friday morning. Meanwhile I'm making a list of some other stuff to ask her about.

[Seven Bends]

Interesting! Sounds like she suspects something other than just herbicide damage (which I'd expect is common enough that she probably wouldn't make a trip out to see it). I'm glad you followed up with them and am eager to hear what it turns out to be.

[AZGardener]

Good to hear the agent is coming to see the affected plants.

[GoDawgs]

The Extension agent came this morning, looked carefully at the plants and took more photos. Then she said that she's thinking it's chemical damage as Curley Top is generally found more out west than around here. She can't remember any cases having been reported in this area. I now have the website addresses of two companies here in Georgia that do soil analysis for chemicals. She said there was no pricing information on the sites but guesses that it could be $100 +. I will dig into that later today.

Since the plants are trying to set tomatoes I asked if there is herbicide in the soil, could it have been taken up by the fruit and if so are they still edible. She said that cows and others graze in sprayed pastures so it should be okay but she's going to find out one way or the other for sure.

Afterwards we walked around the garden where I showed her a few other problems that she took photos of. The pics will be handed over to their "vegetable specialist". Didn't know they had one! One watermelon plant (in a bucket of that soil) is turning yellow and over the past two days developed very dark streaks and spotches so she took a sample leaf to look at under the microscope and also to see if she could grow anything off a culture.

It's nice to have an agent who knows something about gardens, etc. The last agent was a tree guy, knew zip about anything else and wasn't real eager to find out.

Oh, and while were were talking about the potting mix we usually get, Pickles remembered that because the business was in it's last days before closure, they were out of the nursery mix we've always bought. All they had left was compost and that's what we bought. There was no compost in the nursery mix. AH HA! Could be something got into their compost from tainted manure, straw, etc.

I'll report back when I know more about the soil testing.

Meanwhile I have under the lights 17 different tomato plants 5" tall that I need to figure out where to grow!

[MissS]

@GoDawgs I'm so glad that you found someone that was caring and actually wanted to help you.

I think that you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned the compost. They get all kinds of yard and field waste to throw into that. Last year I used a well respected brand of cow manure that caused damage to my plants. The plants lived and produced. As the season went along, they seemed to grow out of it which I appreciated. I hope that yours do too. My plants for this year just went into the beds with the same soil as last year. Hopefully they will grow just fine and there won't be any residue left to affect them. I will know in a week or so.

[Whwoz]

@GoDawgs,sounds like you have an agent worth keeping there. Good luck with everything

[GoDawgs]

Here's that Orangeglo watermelon. This is all so depressing as I was really looking forward to tasting one after all the rave reviews here. The only open area I have to replant seed in the ground has nematodes. That's why it was in a bucket.



Any idea how big a bucket is really necessary to do a watermelon?

Meanwhile, I have 17 tomato plants now at 5-6" tall. I'm thinking about tilling up a strip along the pasture fence and see how many I can fit in there. It's only about 8' from the cultivated garden but has never grown tomatoes so maybe it doesn't have that bacterial wilt that showed up one year and persists in the soil.

[Whwoz]

@GoDawgs, would that area along the pasture fence be nematode free as well? Could you plant the Orangeglo there too?

[GoDawgs]

@Whwoz , in theory there should be no 'todes along that fence. But there's 3' in front of the fence I can dig, then 5' of garden border and then the garden. For sure vines would get into the pasture that I can't access (not our land and the fence around it has a locked gate) and they'd also run into the garden.

A few days ago I discovered that one end of the leaf pile we use for mulching has already composted! So I can downsize the bucket to maybe a seven gallon size and mix some of that compost in with some Kellogg's potting soil and Miracle Grow potting soil and reseed. Worth a try.

This afternoon I measured the space along the fence and it's 30' so I can get maybe 7 or 8 tomatoes in that space.

[GoDawgs]

I e-mailed the testing company after hours on Friday and had a reply first thing this morning. Of the three herbicides the Agent said were the most likely suspects (aminopyralid, clopyralid or picloram), the testing company said:

"We do not have a screen that will test for all 3 of these compounds, however
we can run them.
The cost breakdown is:
Aminopyralid: $130
Clopyralid: $130
Picloram: $150 (Included in our Phenoxy Herbicide Screen) "

After more reading and talking it over, Pickles and I decided against testing because it's now pretty clear that's it's the compost and it really doesn't matter which herbicide is in it.

The money will be put towards one of those new "set and forget" canners that maintains pressure by itself, automatically turns off at the right time and then automatically depressurizes by itself. It's larger than the current one and will save a LOT of time spent monitoring the canner. We'll split the cost. It's electric but because it can sit on the counter and do its thing, it will open up the stove burners for doing more canning of something else with the old All-American canner or waterbathing.

Today I started work on that 30' stretch where we'll plant as many tomatoes as can be shoehorned in. More on that tomorrow in The Dawg Patch.