It is important to add a bit of calcium when growing in pots-if you are intending to grow the elongated type of tomato like san marzano or similar, or many of the plum types,as they are particularly prone to BER, especially if grown in pots.

Some of the large beefsteak types get it too -but not many of them ??

Cherry tomatoes (round type) never seem to get it at all.

With BER the most important thing to attend to is the watering of the pots -as they can dry out within a couple of hours-grow bags too, so are best kept in the just moist state for most of the time.

Thank you! I am not growing the elongated kinds of tomatoes but if I wanted to add calcium now that the plants are already planted, could I just add some lime to the top or do I need to mix it in?

I read about people crushing up TUMS tablets and adding that to the water but I wasn't sure if that would work.

you need a fertilizer that has all marco and mirco nutes in
it, a good fertilizer that has everything in it is foliage
pro from (www.dyna gro.com) you will have to ad lime also
espoma has a garden lime you can order at www.espoma.com
put about 1 1/2 cups in 1.5 cubic foot of potting mix do
not use potting soil,regards.

les

Tomato-tone is available at many hardware stores and garden centers. It's perfect for tomatoes. It's also OMRI approved if you are into organic growing.

Mike

Thanks, Mike, can I use Tomato-tone after the plants are already planted and growing?

Thanks, les. But I have already planted the tomatoes. What can I do now to ensure adequate calcium in the soil?

yum,

Sure, just mix it into the dirt and water as needed.

Mike

As I garden exclusively in containers, I make up my own soil
blend. One ingredient is either crushed oyster shells (from
a feed store) or crushed egg shells that we save in the kitchen and then pound into a gravel-like texture. Someone
also told me to give each tomato plant two aspirins. They
never told me why, but I do it anyhow. LOL

Hello,

Our favorite tomato expert Carolyn137 wrote an excellent response to a question about Blossom End Rot (BER) and I am quoting it here:

With BER there is NO problem with absorption of Ca++ though the roots. The problem is maldistribution within the plant that can be induced by a number of stresses which include uneven delivery of water, too much N, growing in too rich soil, too hot, too cold, too wet, too dry you name it.

As the plants mature they can better handle the streses that can induce BER so usually it goes away.

The two exceptions are first, if the soil has NO Ca++ as confirmed with a soil test, and that's a rare condition, and second, if the soil is too acidic in which Case Ca++ is bound in the soil.

Again, adding lime, egg shells and on and on can not and will not prevent BER b'c absorption of Ca++ thru the roots is OK.

Paste tomatoes are especially susceptible to BER and I think someone in a post above mentioned that.

If you go to the top of this first page and click on the FAQ link and scroll down you'll also find an article about BER in case some of you have never looked at the FAQ's And there';s some darn good articles there as well, but I wouldn't pay any attention to the variety list b'c it's way out of date.

The old information about BER being caused solely by lack of soil Ca++ has been shown to be wrong with research that's been done in the last 20 years or so, but it's going to take another generation before the real story gets into books, websites, magazines, etc. Most of the better websites already have the correct information.

BER affects not only tomatoes, but peppers, squash, cabbage, cauliflower, etc., and it's a huge multimillion dollar problem for the industry, which is WHY all that reasearch was done. For instance, when tissues were taken from a plant that has BER fruits and was assayed for Ca++, the normal level of Ca++ was found, it just wasn't getting to the blossom end of fruits. And there's also a condition called internal BER where the fruits look fine, no evidence of BER externally, but when you cut open the fruit the inside is black

Hope that helps

Carolyn knows tomatoes!

Betsy

Where in South Florida are you? Are you watering with rain/distilled/RO water or tap/ground water?

The 10b areas are coastal Broward, Dade or Monroe, which all have hard water (although I've heard Monroe uses sea water and removes the salt, which would probably mean it's RO or something). If you're watering your plants with hard water, you won't have to add any calcium.

If you want to make it easy on yourself, you could just mix some natural soil in with your potting mix, as the soil in these areas is full of limestone.

If you want to avoid Blossom End Rot, you want to make sure to water regularly once fruit set (especially when the weather gets hot). Tomato leaves curl a bit when they're dry, so they'll let you know if you're not watering enough.

More importantly, you want to make sure you're planting them in at least 10 gallon containers, unless you're growing a variety that is meant for small container gardening. Not only do smaller containers not hold moisture in the soil, they also get really hot in the summer and tomato roots hate that.