Fungicide for Tomatoes

I guess many of us feel proud to have our own garden in our backyard with a variety of plants; either ornamental or others! Well, with all those compliments comes plant care. Many plants do not require too much of your attention however, few mandatory care tips need to be taken to have them grow healthy. Well, one such plant which need your care is the tomato plant. As we all are aware, tomato produces juicy fruits and thus becomes more susceptible to diseases caused by fungi. The common fungal diseases result in rotting of the fruit or roots and spotting on leaves which makes the tomato plant look awful and this calls for quick treatment measures. However, it is better to prevent these from happening and the best way to go about it is by using fungicides, whether homemade or ready-made, both work efficiently.

Fungicide Treatment for Tomatoes

Fungal diseases are the most common problems and mainly affect the plant during or on the onset of rainy season mainly because fungi prefer moisture for optimum growth. When talking about the fungicide treatment, there are several options that would come to your rescue so let us elaborate on each of them.

Natural Fungicide
We all, always look for and prefer natural remedies since they do not cause any side effects yet work efficiently against all the fungal diseases like black spots on tomatoes among others. So here is a list of some homemade fungicides for tomatoes.

• First option is the use of cornmeal. You either soak it in water for a few hours and then spray the resultant mixture on the entire plant or you could mix dry cornmeal granules in the soil.
• Second option, take orange and lemon rinds, mix them with water and then spray the extract on the entire plant. The smell acts as a repellent and protects the plant well.
• Third option, I guess we all know it well, mix vinegar with water and spray it onto the entire plant again.
• Fourth option, if you don't have anything handy, you could take baking soda and mix water in it and spray as aforementioned. Do not use soap detergents or dishwasher detergents since they might irritate the plant.

Organic Fungicide
An option that would work apart from the ones given above is the preparation of organic fungicide at home. Well, for this, take 2 and a half tablespoons of vegetable oil to which add 1 tablespoon baking soda and mix in 1 gallon of water. Shake the mixture well and spray it on the entire plant mainly the leaves. This organic fungicide works excellently well against leaf spot diseases. But as expected, you need to continue spraying the mixture every alternate day preferably routinely, to get positive results.

Copper Fungicide
Apart from these natural preventive measures, there are a number of commercial brands that would help you in case of severe damage on your tomatoes. Most of these are copper fungicides and generally contain mancozeb as the active fungicide ingredient. The brands that sell fungicide are GreenCure, Bonide, Ortho Daconil, Fertilome Broad Spectrum Liquid Fungicide, HiYield Daconil, Rigo Lawn, Serenade, Spilgard, MycoStop, Contants, and Garden Fungicide. As the name clearly indicates, these fungicides have a fair amount of copper in them which can cause wilting of leaves when used in excess amounts, so the use should be restrictive, always.

This was all about fungicide for tomatoes. You could also make tomato cages to protect the plants from environmental damage. The best way to keep fungal diseases from spoiling your tomato species is by making sure you take the proper precaution beforehand, which includes checking the soil texture routinely, watering the plants regularly, giving them appropriate sunshine, pruning them whenever required, using fertilizers and basically taking good care of the little tomato plants to be able to see them bear fruit.