Bacterial wilt is a crucial challenge for tomato farmers, especially greenhouse farmers, as it leads to total crop loss. Of all the crops, tomatoes have the highest returns in greenhouse farming.
However, bacterial wilt quickly affects them, leading to massive losses due to total crop loss.
Have Tomatoes failed in your greenhouse due to bacterial wilt? Try this.
Several solutions have not worked, such as fumigation, solarization, flooding with water and various chemicals, or removal of soil (3ft). In this article, we ask how a farmer can continue farming tomatoes in a greenhouse affected by bacterial wilt.
Hydroponics farming
Hydroponics is a method of growing crops without using soil as a medium. Instead, solutions riched with nutrients such as Nitrogen, Phosphorus and Potassium used,
These nutrients come primarily from fish excrement, duck manure, purchased chemical fertilizers or artificial nutrient solutions. Plants commonly grown hydroponically include tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, cucumbers and strawberries.
How to do it
Remove the infected tomato crops and any other debris and burn them. Dig out the top layer of the soil 1-3ft to remove the highly concentrated soil and dump it as far as possible from the greenhouse.
Look for a black polythene liner (0.1 or 0.25mm) and cover the floor. You can also cement the floor, even though it’s expensive. This will prevent direct contact with infected soil.
Ensure the troughs or pots are well cleaned with a disinfectant and sundried far from the greenhouse where they can’t directly contact the infected soil. Before introducing the crops, thoroughly clean the floor with a disinfectant.
The pots or troughs are placed strategically, ensuring that the planted crops will maintain the recommended spacing of 60cm by 60cm or 60cm by 45cm. Lava rocks are used as a growing medium with a depth of at least 30cm. The use of lava rocks reduces the risk of soil-borne diseases.
Seeds Selection
Ensure you transplant disease-free seedlings. Avoid those raised on the soil, as you may carry the disease with them. Only source hybrid varieties that are quite resistant to bacterial wilt from certified seed raisers.
Read How to Raise Your Seedling.
On arrival, ensure that you don’t contact the infected soil. Transplant them while maintaining the recommended spacing.
Management
An automated system will help reduce greenhouse entry, lowering the risk of introducing the disease. Mob your greenhouse as often as possible with a disinfectant.
Always ensure you have a foot dip with disinfectant at the entry of your greenhouse, and it is better if you can avoid visitors entering it.
A high level of hygiene should be maintained while Spraying, pruning and DE suckering for good, healthy fruits. Farming tomatoes for optimum yields
However, it’s important to note that this might be quite expensive, as the farmer might not cover the cost incurred.
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