Friday, April 10, 2009

Plant Disease?

I realize that part of planting veggies or other plants for that matter comes with it's fair share of difficulties. I am in the garden everyday when I can be pulling weeds and chopping the ground around the plants to loosen the soil. I noticed that my edamame (soybeans) have developed this weird looking discoloration. I'm actively searching for info for what this could possibly be but I have not found anything as of yet. This type of discoloration has also affected some of my cucumbers and presently my tomato bed has shown signs of discoloration on some of the leaves as well. Needless to say I am in a panic and hope that I can get this under control. Hopefully it's a phase and my plants are strong enough to fight this off, but the way it looks is that it bouncing around the garden. Any thoughts?

5 comments:

Kenneth Moore said...

Oh man... They do that to us, don't they? You get all excited because it's almost full-blown spring (prolly is for you, not quite here yet), and then your plants up and get sick.

I keep thinking there's something with the nutrient levels, not necessarily an infection or something. The tomato looks a tad like grey spot fungus, but I'm not convinced. Check out this link:

http://aggie-horticulture.tamu.edu/publications/tomatoproblemsolver/

The soybean, no clue. I think it's different from the tomato, however, but I'm only going from the two photos. It doesn't look like any sort of pathogen I've run across (I have been doing some research on soybean pathogens over the past few days--I think mine have/had Bacterial Pustule). If it is a pathogen, it's likely fungal. (check this out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_soybean_diseases)

There might be a nutrient/pH deficiency/overload that just looks a little different in the different species--that would explain why it's affecting such diverse plants in similar ways, I think. I am going back and forth on that, however... Without more pics, it's hard to tell!

ATW said...

Kenneth- Man you are awesome!! At least now I have some direction to look into. If you think it might be some sort of fungus I will at least try there first and hopefully track it down. Most of the sites that I have visited have great explanations without any pictures and without any guidance on what species of plant the ailment affects. but thinks brotha, I appreciate it. Time to do some research.

ChristyACB said...

I wish I knew. I have some of that on some of my tomatoes too and no clue.

From what I understand it can happen from a couple of things that may not be disease but I can't figure out how to tell for sure. One is from the compost being too hot still when put in the bed or from getting wet leaves and then full sunshine. My compost wasn't hot, your either? And sun did come after rain so how is a person to really know, right?

If you find out, spread the news!

On your tomatoes, are you getting this mostly on the oldest leaf while new ones grow fine? That is what is happening to mine.

ATW said...

Christy- I have noticed that all my younger plants from seedlings have this on them compared to my larger plants. For awhile we were watering right before dark and then we read that may not be a good idea because it promotes mold all the slimy creatures like to roam about in the wet. So now we water first in the morning and if needed a little in the afternoon.

It seems to be affecting my tomatoe leaves but it is not inhibiting there growth. My cucumbers and soy bean seem to have developed they same type of ailment. Kenneth left some sites for me to research and I want to get to the bottom of it.

Disease can wipe out my whole crop and I will be sooo UGH!! So hopefully I can find something out and definately share my findings.

ATW said...

Update- I will post the outcome soon if this works. As suspected by kenneth all the websites point to fungal on the tomatoes. I found this website which is pretty much dummy proof; right up my alley. http://www.extension.umn.edu/yardandgarden/diagnostics/index.html

you find your veggie and it asks you whether the disease is on the stem, leave or fruit and pick which one and then it comes up with all the diseases that affect that part of the plant or fruit. Towards the bottom there will be a common discription and a way cure your affected plants. If you click on the photo it will give you a small snap shot of the disease for the particular plant.

For tomatoes they reccomend that you let the ground dry inbetween watering and to pull off the affected leaves. More to follow....