Tomato diseases are the cause of the waste of large quantities of this crop worldwide. This in particular, with the arrival of heat, can suffer the attack of many pests that significantly influence the development of tomato plants, so finding out how to avoid their diseases and how to fight them can be a vital economic saving for any farmer.

In this post, we break down the main tomato diseases and pests suffered by tomatoes in their birth and development stages, as well as some ways to avoid them. Have you identified any problems in your tomato crop? Do you think your tomato plants suffer from any disease or pest and want to fight it?

Read on:

What are the most common tomato diseases?

Do you know what disease your tomato plants are suffering from? Do your tomatoes have brown lesions, yellow spots, concentric rings or wilting?

Here are the most common tomato diseases:

• Does the tomato leaf have small spots with rings? Does the stem have black, elongated lesions? It could be alternariosis.
• Do tomato leaves and flowers have brown lesions? Do tomatoes have some gray hairy rot? It is probably gray rot.
• Are there yellow spots with something that looks like necrosis? Beware, this is one of the most common: powdery mildew.
• Do you see irregular spots with an oily appearance that necrotize very quickly? It could be downy mildew.
• Do you notice the plant wilting, a yellowing of the lower leaves and the plant drying out? Most likely Fusarium oxysporum.

Tomato virus disease

Viruses are diseases caused by pathogens. In the case of tomato, they are caused by aphids, whitefly and thrips. This is a common problem because of adjacent crops.

Do you notice curling or curling of the leaves, small fruit formation or drooping of the flowers? Perhaps there is a plant with slow growth or yellow leaves? Be careful.

If there is a plant affected by a virus, be aware that there is no cure. Therefore, in this case, the best thing to do is to eliminate the affected plants.

Tomato pests

What are the most common pests in tomato crops?

• When there are high temperatures and low relative humidity, a red spider mite pest may develop. It grows on the underside of leaves, discoloring them and generating yellowish spots.
• Another danger is the white fly. This pest affects the young parts of tomato plants, weakening them.
• Another tomato pest is the aphid, which forms colonies and disperses its concentration centers. It occurs mainly in autumn and spring.
• Thrips are small brown to yellow insects 1 to 2 mm long that lay their eggs in plant tissues.
• Leafminers are another tomato pest that lay their eggs in young leaves and develop larvae that feed on organic material, causing galleries.
• Finally, caterpillars also feed on leaves, usually after laying their eggs on the underside of the leaves.

Prevention: how to avoid tomato diseases

The first thing to make clear is that no crop is 100% free from disease occurrence at any given time. However, there are certain practices that can make it much more difficult to appear.

The main thing is to maintain proper hygiene, both in the growing area and in the company itself, with disinfection points and strict rules for cleaning hands, shoes and clothes when someone enters the greenhouse. It can also be useful to have clean boxes and packaging, as well as transport, containers, pallets, forklifts, scissors, blades, etc.

Professional hydroponic growing systems

In recent years, many growers around the world have opted for a professional cultivation and drainage system that helps a lot to avoid diseases. These are substrate growing units that allow guaranteeing the maximum possible surface area, increasing the number of plants, while generating ample space under the roots to improve aeration and ensure optimal oxygenation.

In this way, it is possible to ensure that the plants are in very good health and developing in a suitable state to provide a large number of tomatoes and also of a higher quality.

It should be noted that plants in good health are more likely to resist the possible occurrence of a tomato disease. To this end, it is always a good idea for plants to live in environments with adequate lighting, watering and nutrition.

To that end, it is a good idea to grow tomatoes under glass using professional growing and drainage systems such as these.

If you would like to incorporate a professional growing and drainage system into your plantation to ensure the optimal health of your tomato plants, do not hesitate to contact us for a no-obligation quote:

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