Tomato Blossom End Rot

Hi Folks: I have some Early Girl tomatoes planted the second week of May. They have done well reaching six foot high with lots of blooms and a good number of tomatoes. I have three already that have ripened but all had blossom end rot. This despite several egg shells crushed with each plant. We have had some extremes in Central Maryland, the wettest month of June since the late 1890s and some pretty good runs of upper 90 temps for awhile. I haven't been watering since we have had so much rain. I have heard that spraying with calcium solution made for blossom-end rot is sometimes effecting in salvaging a crop, assuming that I have a poor uptake of calcium. I have seen of people using a blender to bring up egg shells, is this effective, or is there an aftermarket organic product? Thanks for any advice in helping salvage these tomatoes.

Michael Love(is that your real name?)

Anyhow Michael I went looking to see about this as I have experienced it in the past in a tomato garden
I had. I always thought it was slugs or bugs of some kind but your weather conditions sure played a
big part in this. I learned a bunch, too much nitrogen can be to blame. The uptake of calcium, poor soil PH, etc.

I am going to post a few links so others can read up to, one is from Cornell(maybe they know something).

Cornell Says

Gardener.com (Ad Heavy, but informative)

And as an acid reflux kind of guy, I really love this fix. I like to read the comments under a video to see if anyone
calls, "Bogus!" (But they didn't.) I say it's worth a try, especially considering the cost. The kid describes how it bypasses the roots
and goes right to the plant where it is needed, through the leaves.



TUMS *I think the non-generic brand would dissolve better and crush better.

Mike Feddersen wrote:Michael Love(is that your real name?)

Thanks Mike and that is my real name. Your links especially the video were very helpful. I'll give some feedback on results.

Michael, there are some tomatoes that are just vulnerable to blossom end rot, no matter what you do, often the heirlooms. But the majority of the time it's lack of calcium that the plant can't uptake. Ground up egg shells are not something the tiny roots an uptake. It used to be that powdered milk was cheap and it could be added to the water. If you want to dilute milk, it won't help the ones that have it. It will help the forming tomatoes.

Boxed forms of calcium can take up to 6 months to be available to plant roots under perfect conditions, sometimes longer.

Compost tea from compost made from as many things as you can put in it, watered in, should help the next round of forming tomatoes.

When planting, compost trenches or compost/manure mounds that are planted in and covered with crushed leaves or mowed grass usually provide enough of everything to avoid most tomato issues.

You can just cut the bottom off and use the tops of the tomatoes.

Quite often the problem isn't a lack of calcium in the soil that is the problem, but a lack of magnesium. The magnesium is required for proper uptake of the calcium. I've historically had a problem with blossom end rot, especially on Roma types, so this year I put a Tbl. of epsom salts in each hole as I transplanted the tomatoes. I haven't even seen a sign of blossom end rot this season. I think you could do a foliar spray with a Tbl. epsom salts to 1 qt water. This should help out quite a bit.

At my place it seemed like some varieties were highly susceptible to Blossom End Rot, and some varieties never got it, so I stopped growing the susceptible varieties.

Epsom salts (magnesium sulfate) worked for us. Its cheap enough and can be mixed into the soil around the plant.