herbicide damage? please help

SunshineZone7

9 years ago

Is this herbicide damage? It sure looks like it to me. Can it be anything else causing these distorted leaves?

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Comments (10)

SunshineZone7
Original Author
9 years ago
Another pic
digdirt2
9 years ago
Possible, even probable. Do you know for a fact that herbicides have been used in the area?

But it is minor in the photos so other than monitoring it for further development I wouldn't worry too much about it.

Dave
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SunshineZone7
Original Author
9 years ago
We use nothing in our yard. However neighbors use weed and feed type products. Last year my very young tomato plants had herbicide damage (posted pics on here) so I have since read up on it. These plants this year are big...over my head, and have green tomatoes on them, so i hope they will be OK.

This makes me want to get some land far far away from people! I have an organic garden and do not want other people tainting it! People are very uneducated when it comes herbicides and pesticides. I grow all my veggies from seed, it takes time but I love it. When this happens it is very upsetting :(
edweather USDA 9a, HZ 9, Sunset 28
9 years ago
That is very minor damage and your plants will be fine.
labradors_gw
9 years ago
I too have some tomatoes with potato-leaf foliage which look very healthy, but upon close inspection, some of the leaves look just a little bit distorted. Our neighbours probably are not close enough for herbicide drift to be a problem, so I am crossing my fingers and hoping that sometimes the leaves just are not perfect. I've decided not to get too worried about this.

I used just a little bit of coir (peat) around them all, and I wonder if it could possibly be something to do with that.

Time will tell for both of us, I think!

Linda
seysonn
9 years ago
If your neighbor is using granular weed n feed, it should not be a problem but if they use liquid spray type then there is a possibility of some drift, depending how the two properties are situated.

Peat or coir should not be a problem. Most , if not all, potting soils have them.
User
9 years ago
My friend who contributes his grass clippings to my compost pile finally admitted to using weed and feed on his lawn. Now I am thinking that my compost is tainted because my tomatoes are suffering from leaf curl. We have also had a lot of rain, more than usual. The compost I used this year is over one year old since I didn't have a garden last year. What do you think?
digdirt2
9 years ago
I'm thinking you found the cause of your problem. But it is minor damage as already mentioned - likely given the age of the compost.

I wouldn't use the current batch of compost until next year to give it more time to dissipate but I wouldn't accept any further grass clippings from the neighbor.

Dave
yardenman
9 years ago
Your plants may recover. But I never accept compostable material from neighbors. They lie. But at least yours admitted using them.
lycomania
9 years ago
The first (or second?) year I planted tomatoes, full of beginner's fervor, I had some big herbicide damage midway through the season. I recalled that my neighbor (who is a wonderful neighbor) sprayed Roundup on gravel driveway areas (some of which were right next to my beloved tomatoes). Neither he nor I knew at the time how sensitive tomato plants were, and he probably didn't even know I was growing something like tomatoes at the time. Heck, I was using herbicides in my own yard at the time.

I believe my neighbor has every right to tend to his issues as he sees fit. Fortunately, he is the most amazing neighbor one could hope for, so when I explained to him what I had learned, and asked him if he would let me try to fix his weeds the next spring to see if I could solve both of our problems, he magnanimously agreed.

I settled on trying Preen pre-emergent on all the areas of his driveway that I thought were in drift-distance to my plot, and it turned out that he was even happier with those results than the Roundup results. He asked me what I used so he could continue it in the future.