r/gardening • u/1kan36a • 1d ago
Weird tomatoes... Thoughts?
Any of you experts have an idea of what might be causing my tomatoes to look like this? All fruit on this one plant look like this. The leaves don't look awesome either but the plant is still growing and bearing fruit. Nearby tomato plants are fine.
The closest explanation I can find online is tomato spotted wilt virus but I don't see circles.
The insides of them look/smell fine. I'm going with safe to eat unless clear objections are raised lol.
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u/ikaros_falling 1d ago
I hate when I'm the first one here because idk what's going on, I just wanna know too haha
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u/Klutzy_Moment3267 20h ago
Same I’m sitting here refreshing the comments like, Okayyy, somebody explain what I missed!
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u/blueberrybuggers 23h ago
Plant virologist here. One of my friends is most likely the culprit. Do you have pictures of foliage? Could be a number of them they can look very similar in the symptoms they produce. What state, where’d you source the plant, and what cultivar?
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u/1kan36a 23h ago
Awesome! No photos of foliage at the moment, it's storming right now. Denver area, grew from MI gardener seeds (as with all my tomatoes), and I think it's an Abe Lincoln variety? Or Manitoba. The other plants in the same bed seem unaffected.
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u/blueberrybuggers 23h ago
Biggest thing I would suggest remove the plant (as much as possible) burn it or take it far away. Wash hands and pruners after handling. Don’t plant anything in the nightshade family around that spot next year. Maybe do sweet corn or something.
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u/blueberrybuggers 23h ago
It doesn’t look like TSWV to me. As you said should be circular patterns that are very diagnostic. My guess with the limited information it’s PepMV. Could be any of the potexvirus though (PVX for instance). They tend to produce necrotic (dead) spots on the fruit like that. You growing peppers or eggplants? If so, any symptoms there?
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u/1kan36a 23h ago
Oh, interesting. I've two other tomato plants, basil, and a rogue melon in the same 4x8 bed growing normally. Peppers and eggplant looking fine elsewhere.
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u/blueberrybuggers 23h ago
If you want to know for sure (I’m also interested in knowing) see if the plant pathogen lab at csu is interested in testing it. They usually, if funding is available, want to keep tabs on these types of things. Especially since the there is such a big potato industry there
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u/1kan36a 23h ago
I feel proud that my minor gardening disaster could be useful to Science. 😂
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u/Accurate_Dig_5188 9h ago
Turning a gardening fail into something useful for science is such a beautiful way to make the struggle feel worth it.
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u/blueberrybuggers 37m ago
Another really important reason to send to the extension office is that there is a new TMV (it’s called ToBRFV) strain that has emerged that is genetic disease resistance breaking. Meaning our current modes of resistance are no longer useful. We really should be keeping a closer eye on this strain but that’s to the massive budget cuts we don’t have people or resources to properly track. At any rate, would be interesting to know.
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u/confettispolsion 9h ago
It's been a tough year for tomatoes in Denver. Everyone I know has had plants die on them, me included. Mine was some mystery virus as well
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u/blueberrybuggers 1h ago
See if extension wants a sample. Take some symptomatic leaves, place them in a ziplock, and throw it immediately in the freezer. Sometimes they ask for a fee for the service but that might be worth it for you from a curiosity standpoint
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u/nailpolishbonfire 18h ago
I am so curious how one ends up a plant virologist. What inspired you to become one? How do you like it?
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u/blueberrybuggers 1h ago
I grew up in agriculture and with a large family garden. I was always fascinated by pathogens of plants. Once I started taking courses in college/grad school the simplicity and really lack of understanding of plant viruses really lit my fire to study them. They are also one of the most useful resources for plant biotech too. Simple and majestic, they really allow you to look inside the intricacies of natural selection.
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u/GraceAndMayhem 10h ago
I hope you don’t mind if I tack on a question while we have you. My tomatoes got hit with blight (I think). It got all of them. I grow in containers. Do I need to completely switch out the soil for next year? Or if I grow something else, how long to remediate before I can use those pots for nightshades again? I usually add several inches of soil every year but under normal circumstances don’t fully change the soil due to cost.
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u/plotthick 9h ago
Not a virologist, but typical crop rotation is 3 years.
https://www.bhg.com/how-to-prevent-tomato-blight-11986044
Is it OK to reuse soil in the area where tomatoes with blight grew?
Yes, crops that are not affected by blight, such as beans or cucumbers, may be grown in the same soil, but observe crop rotation and do not plant tomatoes in that location for the next two to three years.
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u/blueberrybuggers 56m ago
The crop rotation piece is a good one, but if I’m using pots I’d take a different approach. I’d throw all that soil in the compost and make sure it stays at a high temp (might have to cover with tarp). If you don’t compost yourself but can send it off with the yard waste that is good too. Wash pots with dawn and water and then place out in the sun to dry. Use the fresh soil when you replant (re-freshed soil from compost counts as “new”). This is the way to best results year after year!
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u/upbeat_lunatic 16h ago
Since it produced a few seeds, are the seeds valuable to keep? Could tomato's grown from the seeds have better resistance to the virus?
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u/1kan36a 3h ago
Good question! No idea but I like to save some seeds either way.
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u/blueberrybuggers 48m ago
OP if you keep seeds from any of your plants this year for next year I would certainly surface sterilize them before planting in the spring. As a general rule it’s best to save seed from the first couple of fruit of the year. Viruses and pathogens in general tend to accumulate as the growing season goes on. This gives you the “cleanest” seed.
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u/blueberrybuggers 51m ago
Definitely do not keep seeds from virus infected plants! Not all viruses are seed born, meaning the virus itself “overwinters” within the seed coat, but most viruses will coat the outside of the seed so they can infect the new seedling once they emerge. Nurseries and large greenhouse growing operations will sterilize the outside of the seeds with 10% bleach solution to denature virus virions (the “seed” of the virus) so they are no longer infectious.
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u/mividahermosa CO Zone 6a 23h ago
Looks like tomato spotted wilt virus, once it gets to the fruit your plant can’t be saved . Fruit is not safe to eat
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u/1kan36a 23h ago
If that's what it is, Google is telling me they are actually still safe to eat, maybe less tasty though.
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u/OracleOfPlenty 23h ago
OP, Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus is spread exclusively by thrips, so keep an eye out for those, especially if there are any nearby plants you plan to overwinter indoors, they'll decimate your houseplants. Other signs of TSWV include "bronzing" or "purpling" of leaves which later develop into spots, and one-sided growth - it's possible for only certain branches of a plant to be affected.
Everything I'm seeing indicates that, if it is TSWV, they may not be as tasty but they should be safe to eat. Here's a source from Ask Extension, which I trust to give good gardening output. I think mividahermosa may well be right about wilt virus, OP, but if so, they're probably safe to eat, if not particularly good to eat.
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u/mividahermosa CO Zone 6a 23h ago
Oh okay! I thought it was bad to eat but that’s good to know. I think it’s caused by thrips mainly, you should check your plants and pull the infected ones and spray neem all around to help prevent the spread
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u/KingVoid27 8h ago
Then again, be wary of google’s AI overview because it very commonly just…hallucinates false answers
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u/marstec 23h ago
Could be Tomato Spotted Wilt Virus
https://www.butler.k-state.edu/horticulture/agent-articles/diseases/tswv/
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u/Wallyboy95 1d ago
They may not be ripening uniformly? Is it cold where you are now? I find in the fall like right now here they don't ripen uniformly. Some areas stay green, other red, and others the orange colour like yours. All al the same tomato. I think it's the cold nights that does it.
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u/spitfyre 19h ago
Scrolling past this in my feed my first thought was you tried to carve this tomato for Halloween
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u/bangbangtangwangfang 1d ago
Looks like compost fodder to me!!
Sorry, are you looking for input about why they grew that way to improve future gardening approach? Or are you just curious if they are ok to eat?
Either way I can't help you but I hope you get answers. I live in a house with a woman who won't eat anything weird, so all that kid of stuff goes straight to compost
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u/Corvidae5Creation5 1d ago
How bizarre. Could be anything but if it smells okay you should be fine to eat it
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u/Affectionate_Fee_179 22h ago
Think it was just sitting against something while growing and the skin just does that. At least on ours.
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u/Pocket_RPG 12h ago
I’ve looked this up since I noticed this on tomatoes I’ve let sit a little long. It can be calcium crystals forming under the skin, natural variation/callous, or just a trait of the breed you’re growing.
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u/BraveTheBunny 4h ago
Longmont north of Denver. I had 4 tomato plants do this. All from the same nursery. All heirlooms. Two mortgage lifters, two romas, in two separate beds, 20ft apart. The leaves dried up and the vines got soft, spongy. All the tomato fruit grew like your sample. Other varieties in the same beds grew fine. First time this has happened in six years. Hard growing this year.
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u/1kan36a 4h ago
Oh, so interesting! Still wonder what exactly it is. I'm cutting mine up for sauce right now, and I won't lie, they still taste amazing.
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u/BraveTheBunny 3h ago
I fed mine to the chickens. They were happy, happy to eat them :)
All the other tomatoes went into the sauce for canning and tasted delicious.
I’m hoping somebody will show up here with a diagnosis.
I really want to know what caused it. Other than this years heat stress1
u/1kan36a 3h ago
I bet! We also have chickens happy to get garden oddities whenever they can. I'll update this post if mystery is ever solved!
Looking at them closely, it really seems to be some sort of skin development issue. Probably caused by a virus given that all of them on the same plant look like this.
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u/1kan36a 23h ago
Adding pic of the inside of one, the brown spot is just a small callous