Has anybody seen a plant look like this before? I water it daily in the morning. It has east facing sun. The tomatoes look great but this plant looks awful. I’ve given it fertilizer a couple times over the summer. I have no idea what I did wrong.
Thanks in advance for any advice feedback or tips.
by cjsmoothe
21 Comments
Possibly overwatered? Any of the tomatoes pop? How moist is soil?
She’s at the end of her lifespan.
Mine are in drip system on timers and looked great all summer. Just this week they look like that. I picked all the tomatoes and brought inside to let them ripen.
Small pot + end of season = a plant that looks like this.
Droopy leaves in my experience typically means not enough water, but I don’t have mine in pots so maybe you need more fertilizer? They don’t look dead to me, just sad.
Was there a frost?
Mine got late blight – I tried all the branches, and just letting them do their things while the remaining tomatoes continue to ripen.
We had a couple of nights where the temperature were close to frost level. Could this have happpened to your plant?
Mine look like that due to the heat wave we had last month. I am hoping for a rebound.
Do you have a water tray under the pot? Maybe the soil got hydrophobic and the plant’s roots need a bit of help to actually take in water?
Wilt is a thing with tomatoes. Two of my plants got it in early summer. Hubs wanted to rip them out, I said let’s wait.
We cut them back a bit, and two weeks later they were producing again.
I’m in MN and my plants still look great and have lots of tomatoes. They’re not on a pot, but on a raised bed. I did get started kind of late with planting the seedlings and everything but I don’t think that would matter as far as the season being over.
Was there a recent heat wave?
Your soil likely went hydrophobic, you didn’t realize it, and your plant said ‘fuck it’.
Which zone are you in?
Honestly that pot is wayyyy too small, and that’s why the plant doesn’t look that big either! I have a five gallon bucket I use for my tomatoes, and the roots will fill the entire thing. I’d say this plant is root bound!
I don’t know but my tomato plant looked like yours mid-way through season. I gave miracle grow twice and 2 wks later they looked like that. It came back though and even grew tomatoes from areas of the plant I thought were done due to top 3 ft of entire plant broke, (likely a squirrel). Unless it tires out soon-I’m going to have just as many tomatoes as I had at the plant’s height of production… (I did all but stop pruning suckers after thinking it was done fruiting about a month and half ago then it just blew up with growth including healthy berries/tomatoes)
How cold is it at night now?
Fertilize
It’s reached the end of its life cycle. Good plant. Thanks for playing.
Time for the clippers, and wait for the greenies to ripen on the vine.
Needs some water too