RT x GDZ F1 fruiting despite disease

Looks like the RT x GDZ #16 F1 produces fruit that are clearly fasciated like either parent was, suggesting either that it is monogenic or was self-pollinated.    Here are an early stage fruit and a separate, impressive megabloom.

A new disease - bacterial canker?

My RT x GDZ F1 plant in 5 gal bucket seemed to have a unique disease/condition not seen in any of the other plants.    Browning of leaf margins ("marginal scorch"), mainly, on older leaves at the end of branches, and without profound wilting.  This is different than the wilt I've often seen in my garden bed tomatoes.  The leaf appearance matches images of what is most often called "bacterial canker" via online research. 

I isolated the pot from the other plants and around June 15 I trimmed off all of the affected branches, using an old scissors I was discarding anyway so as not to contaminate other plants.   Here are before and after photos.

Hay bales this year...meh

Not thrilled this year with progress in growing veggies in hay bales.   I have 2 bales and I think curing them went fine...   Tried direct seeding lettuce with mixed results; also direct seeding a few cucumbers seeds.  I noticed several sprouts disappeared overnight - something's eating 'em.  One row of lettuce is growing but one row lost all the sprouts. I transplanted my dill and cilantro starts into the bales but they didn't last long.   Transplanted my little pepper plants but something has been eating those too so they will probably not make it.  It's also been pretty hot and dry.   I put in a couple store-bought basil plants and they are surviving but need water every day.

Other 2018 crosses germinated mostly ok

As of 5/27/19 here are germination rates (after about 10 days):
For 2018 crosses #18, 30, 40, 45, 56 each: out of 12 seeds sowed, germ N = 5, 8, 11, 7, 1.
Neither of the 2 seeds from #26 germinated, which is not surprising.

Testing my 2018 crosses more thoroughly

Since two of my 2018 F1s had seemed to totally resist germinating, I decided to test all of my 2018 F1 seeds.   To recap, I already sowed 48, 22, 13, 16.  13 and 16 had multiple germinations with only 6 seeds sowed each.  After a failed attempt and repeat tests, 48 and 22 failed (total 18 seeds) and 57 failed (total 36 seeds).

Therefore ~5/16/19 I sowed 12 seeds each of the remainders - 56, 30, 18, 40, 45; There were only 2 seeds from #26 and the fruit was poor, so not expecting those to work but I sowed those too.  Incubating these outside since it's quite warm already.

As of 5/23/19 there are a few plants emerging, including one from #30, ZPT x GDZ.  Transferred to 4 inch pot.

New crosses 2018
cross/fruit#	collected	type
#56	7/6/18	pBTD x F4-46A2.2
#26	7/31/18	RT x GDZ
#57	7/21/18	ZPT x KB
#48	7/24/18	CG x FL
#22	7/24/18	CG x FL
#13	7/21/18	F4 55A7.3 x pBTD
#16	8/9/18	RT x GDZ
#18	8/12/18	F4-46A2.2 x pBTD
#30	9/2/18	ZPT x GDZ
#40	8/10/18	GDZ x RT
#45	8/14/18	pBTD x F4-46A2.2

Homemade low-ammonia, high-calcium fertilizer for tomato plants

This fertilizer is designed to have high calcium but minimal ammonia.  The plants need calcium to minimize end-rot, but ammonium ions have been reported to interfere with calcium uptake.


• 2 cups Hi-Yield Calcium Nitrate.   Can buy on Amazon.

• 1 cup 26-0-4 Vigoro lawn fertilizer; its nitrogen is mainly in the form of urea, not ammonium nitrate like many other fertilizers

• 1 cup Triple Super Phosphate 0-46-0, from Easy Peasy Plants.

• 10 cups wood ash.  I made this the old-fashioned way in my fire pit.  Wood ash has about 5% potash  (potassium) and about 1% phosphate, and as a bonus has a lot of calcium - up to 25% calcium carbonate. An alternative could be Espoma potash 0-0-60 6 lbs.   

This should make 14 cups.  I estimate this to have a makeup that is very close to 4-4-4 NPK, and is ~5% calcium.   Use 1/2 cup per 5 gal of planting medium.   

In practice, I carefully measure this "14 cups" but in the end I measured out 6 batches of 3 x 5 gal and it was gone, so I only got about 9 cups out of it !  I believe that when I thoroughly mixed the ingredients it compressed together, so I should have probably re-measured the whole batch and adjusted accordingly.  This means that I may have overshot the fertlizing by about 50% or so.

Setting up 5-gal containers: Homemade planting medium.

I have set up 19 tomato plants in 5-gal buckets.

All were first transplanted to 4-inch tall cowpots for a week or two and hardened outdoors.  The original medium for seeding and first transplant was Jiffy organic seed starting mix, which has worked pretty well for me the last few years - very low fungus/damping off problems with this stuff.  In fact this year I think I had zero damping off.  I am pretty careful about not overwatering.

The 5-gal bucket medium is made as follows.  This makes 15 gal, enough for 3 buckets, and convenient to make up in a wheelbarrow.

1. 5 gal peat moss.

2. 5 gal vermiculite or perlite.  I used either in different batches, due to availability at home depot.

3. 5 gal cheap topsoil.   Specifically this has no added fertilizer.  Most name-brand topsoils have fertilizer added so I avoided these.  Instead I used Evergreen brand from home depot.  As far as I can tell, the batch I purchased this year is simply ground up wood shavings - it basically looks like wood mulch, just more finely chopped up as compared to regular mulch.   I am pretty sure this product varies regionally, and maybe from year to year.   So although this has no added fertilizer, it certainly is 100% organic material.   

4. 1 & 1/2 cups of homemade fertilizer.    See the separate post for this recipe.

Mix all ingredients in wheelbarrow.  Makes enough for three 5-gal buckets.   I find it helpful to mist the peat moss and vermiculite with water after dispensing them, as they are very dusty.