I honestly try very hard NOT to be overparanoid about things like this. I do not ever use anything in my garden except for homemade compost. I don't even add things to my soil as most gardeners do. I am also the person who uses steam to clean her house instead of chemicals when at all possible. I also figure though that for the times I do need to buy things in the stores, like right now when my garden is being moved and my canned goods are running out, I have little control over what they have done to the plants they grew my food on and they probably did WAY worse than a little copper fungicide. I don't have pets, but I do have a now 3 and 4 year old. Last year when they were 2 and 3 I didn't let them in the garden for the day I sprayed , but after that I let them back in. BUT, my kids also don't munch on leaves (well not of the tomato plants anyway) so I am not sure how I would feel about that. I am not sure what your plan for next year is, but I did my research before deciding to move my garden for other reasons. I was going to do solar sterilization. You will obviously need to do something otherwise you will have the same issue next year that you have this year. I will add a link below to solar sterilization. I haven't tried it, but with my tomatoes dying off early I figured I had enough time to cut my losses cover the garden up and bake the soil if I needed to get it ready for this year. I would be curious if anyone on GW has tried it. Here is a link that might be useful: Soil solarization

All the inner leaves turned yellow first, ***** That's not typical of foliage infections caused by either bacteria or fungi. The spots on the leaves may have a yellow halo around them, but only initially. It sounds more like a systemic disease, but if so you should see some wilting. There are several diseases that can cause lesions on the stems, and yes, Early Blight is one of them, but there are many others. All the anti-fungals in the world aren't going to help if the infections are being caused by bacterial pathogns. If I were you I'd still go to that Problem Solver #2 in the Pest and Disease Forum and find the post that gives the TAMU link and take a look. Or could you post some pictures yourself? I in no way inteded to say that looking at pictures is useless, far from it,all I said was that often IDing diseases by pictures can be difficult. But there are many who have done so easily. Your local extension can also be a great help in helping to ID toamto diseases and I certainly would try there first before going to most nurseries. If it's Early Blight the spots on the leaves have distinctive concentric rings and the spots may be surrounded by a yellow halo. If it starts looking more bacterial after you look at some pictures then I'd get a copper containing prep and try that. If it's a systemic disease such as Fusarium that['s causing the foliage to turn yellow, then there is nothing that can help such systemic diseases. And Fusarium is found in many places in CA. but you should be seeing some wilting if it's Fusarium.\\And yes, there can be more than one infection present on a given plant at the same time. Carolyn

Sunshine...I feel your pain...hate is an OK word to use....it's emotional when you try so hard and your efforts are thwarted. I've never used a fungicide but will research it also. My problem is that it is very labor intensive to apply (especially with 76 plants) and every time I attempt to spray we get a downpour. Perhaps less plants and a concerted effort to find a good organic fungicide and apply it from the get-go will delay the inevitable...there's always next year. Hang in there, you're not alone. This post was edited by LKZZ on Wed, Aug 13, 14 at 21:49

Septoria leaf spots are taking over my tomatoes this year too probably facilitated by the nonstop raining. The variety I observed so far (in my garden) that resists the virus are Cherokee Purple, Aunt Ruby German's Green, Cowlick's Brandywine and Kellog's Breakfast. They grow right next to the ones that suffered from it.