Dawn - I assume you already know that when they are leggy and lanky like that they aren't getting nearly enough sun to be really healthy plants, right? That makes them very susceptible to any other problems.

And that makes me wonder how quickly your soil in that bed drains and how quickly it dries out or if it stays water-logged? Overly wet soil can cause rapid wilting due to root rot. have you checked the soil moisture level about 6" down before watering?

Then there is possibility of contaminated mulch that many have been talking about lately - hay and straw that has been contaminated with herbicides. Do you know the source of your mulch?

When it comes to disease issues the odds with sudden wilting always favor Bacterial Wilt which is both seed and soil borne. So that is a possibility but the odds favor it being some sort of growing condition issue rather than disease.

Dave

Dave,

Thank you. I know they are leggy :( unfortunately, it's one of the only spots where I can actually grow halfway decent tomatoes other than the wood bed in the side yard. As a result, I always plant the more productive cherry type tomatoes knowing I will get a decent harvest, albeit smaller than if they were full plants. I promise though that they actually look worse than normal because I have cut a ton of leaves off because of early blight. It was one of the only options to control it because up until about the last week or two it literally would rain every day or two making applying daconil nearly impossible and I honestly didn't feel comfortable applying it that often. We got over 3" in a week about 2 weeks ago...

This bed actually has problems retaining moisture because it is full of wood/bark mulch as it was when I bought it. I know that is bad and I was going to change the soil this year, but an injury earlier in the year made that plan a bust. I will be putting in new soil next year. When I pulled the one plant up, and checked the soil, it was fairly dry, not bone dry, but not saturated either. today was actually the first day I watered my plants since planting (other than to feed) since I planted them. It has been almost a week at least since it rained, and with it this hot, I thought it was a water issue. The ones wilting from the heat though and very mild and barely noticeable with only the top leaves showing problems in the absolute midday sun.

As for the mulch, I do not know anything about where it came from other than it is straw that was bought from a hardware/ feed store up the street. It has been on the plants for 2 months since the day I planted them. The ones in the wood box bed have the same mulch and no problems are seen.

I'm just wondering if I should pull the plant up or let it be? Do you think it could be a result of the miracle gro? That was the only thing that changed before this happened.

Also, if it was bacterial wilt, would the cutting have recovered like it did?

I'm not sure what to do at this point...

Dawn

I think the soil where the roots spread dries out and does not get enough water and that causes wilting . My beds were covered with black plastic and I was watering the plants through small cuttings around them. I warm/hot days the new growth kept wilting. Finally I took the plastic out and started watering real good so the whole beds got watered. >>>> wilt no more. Today was 90F and no wilting.
If as you said, if your beds are well drained , I would go ahead and water generously until you see the water is coming out around , under the soil level.
I don't think that over watering is going to be a problem with the kind of soil you have.

Sey

Sey,

That's the problem I'm having though. The watering isn't helping these plants recover. I watered VERY good for the plant in the picture probably 2 hours prior to the picture being taken and there was no improvement at all.

But the one I pulled up, the cutting I potted is doing great. So if a heavy watering isn't helping, but a wilted cutting can come back to life with no roots yet formed... That would mean it's either a soil or root problem, right?

Well, I figured it out... It is bacterial wilt :(

I cut a sucker off another wilting plant close to the ground and it was brown inside. I stuck it in a cup of water and in less than a minute the white strands started coming out of the bottom. I did it on the wilted plant too that was in the picture even though the stem was not as brown and immediately the white strands started oozing from the cut.

I seriously want to cry right now... Is there anything that can be done to possibly save the remaining plants? They are not wilting at this moment but I fear it will come. I pulled all of the wilting plants that I saw (3 in total) and possibly found the source as I think I've had one that had been infected with it all season as it had been wilty and stunted ever since I transplanted. But it would look ok and recover at night and even produced a tomato, so I didn't think it had something like bacterial wilt, ugh.

The soil WILL be replaced this fall or spring and cages and tools washed in bleach solution tomorrow. In the meantime, now what do I do???

Also, no point in planting new tomatoes in that bed now as they will just get it too right? Can I plant peppers in that bed for this season? I have a little room left is why I am wondering.

Dawn, who really, really wants to cry right now :(

What do you mean by heavy watering?

Oh Dawn, I am so sorry. I got into container gardening because of my infected soil. When we first moved here I created a new garden, amended the soil really good and after planting my tomatoes they all failed from herbicide lurking in the soil. What a huge disappointment. I cried. The second year I planted peas to test the soil early and they all died so I knew the soil was still infected. I got into container gardening that year. I know how devastated you are. I have never had bacterial wilt so cannot help you with what to do. But I sure do sympathize.

Jennie

I truly feel for you. Last year, my second year with tomato gardening, I had mine in containers. I lost one by one to some kind of wilt plus my containers were too small anyway. This year I am having better luck in ground. But I do remember wanting to cry last year.

Dawn, I feel for you.

In my first year of growing tomatoes, I didn't mulch, I didn't fungicide the plants after transplanting.

I lost EVERYTHING !

Nice plants wilting.

In less than a week everything was gone !

Even today I don't know what happened.

I lost a bunch of peppers this year because of bacterial wilt. The recipe for that was a very heavy rain on a bed that was very heavily mulched. So the bed just didn't dry out. I turned the soil over two weeks later (after two weeks of sun and heat) and found big wet clumps. Gaack.

I'm not convinced that these beds are damaged in the long term. I understand that the bacteria involved can be killed by aeration, sunlight, and some drying. So I recommend turning the soil well several times during the next few months and then trying again in the fall. I had a couple of pepper plants die in the same way last year, at which time I didn't recognize the cause of death to be BW. After good cultivation of the bed I planted tomatoes in exactly the same place this year. They are doing fantastic.

I wouldn't plant peppers in that bed...I think they need even more light than tomatoes.