Getting near September now, that means October is soon, which means getting the vegetable garden going again.
I'm a huge fan of homegrown tomatoes - you can't beat the taste over the watery nothingness you get from the supermarkets. Though I have a really hard time keeping the blight and fungus away from the plants, especially in the humidity in Auckland. It seems every year is the same, they start off well and make great progress looking really healthy until about December/January, then those leaves at the bottom start to turn yellow and from then on they're history - I strip off the affected leaves and stems but end up with nothing on them but fruit which doesn't ripen properly and the whole plants die away. So disappointing!
Plants are grown outdoors in plastic planter buckets, in a wind sheltered sunny spot. I pot them with Tomato mix and spray every couple of weeks with a store bought copper fungicide. I remove all the laterals and make sure the plants get good air circulation around the base. Last year I tried a tip whereby you take a piece of solid core copper wire and poke through the stem just above the soil - seemed like a good plan to let the copper leach into the plant and provide protection - but didn't work.
Any knowledgeable GZers out there have any thoughts or ideas or success stories with growing tomatoes in the humidity of the Auckland spring/summer??