Is this Cat Face or what? How to fix the problem?

[Gary350]

I have been getting tomatoes that look like this. I'm not sure if this is cat face. How do I solve this problem?

Tomatoes plants are shading them self, they are crowded pretty good the tomato plant leaves shade the tomatoes.

The tomatoes plants get full sun in the morning when its not so hot. Plants get shade from direct sunlight after 1 pm from 8 foot tall corn plants.

Temperature here is 75 degrees at 6 am, 95 degrees at 10:30 am, 110 degrees about 2 PM.

Soil PH is 8.

Plants get irrigation at 7 pm every evening for about 10 minutes each day. Plants seem to be getting plenty of water.

Sun rise about 5 am, sunset about 8:30 pm.

Tomatoes did have blossom end rot but that problem seems to be solved. I bought a $2 bag of cement to use for lime.

I fertilized with 16/16/16 a few times April and May. All Arizona fertilizer contains 10% sulfur because of the alkaline soil.

Arizona soil has NO food value at all. Soil is an extremely fine sand. Soil is strange a little bit of water makes the soil hard like cement but too much water makes quick sand. I forgot to turn the soaker hose off once after 1 hour I could not walk across the garden without sinking knee deep in the soil.

[Dillbert]

it's not cat-facing. wrong end of the fruit . . .

looks like the Class A typical cracking due to uneven moisture......

[cynthia_h]

Yep. What Dillbert said: cracking due to uneven moisture in the soil.

Cynthia H.
Sunset Zone 17, USDA Zone 9

[hendi_alex]

What problem! Fix those lovely suckers by peeling, slicing, and eating! Everyone should have such problem tomatoes. IMO the only way that those would be considered 'problem' tomatoes is if you intend to sell them at market.

[imafan26]

Cracking is a sign of uneven watering, but radial cracking like the kind you have may simply be related to the variety you have chosen. While not pretty, if the cracks are not too deep, the fruit is still edible. There are crack resistant varieties, but usually prettier is not tastier, so pick one if you prefer better taste, the fruit may not be all that pretty. If you want pretty, then sometimes there are other trade offs.

[sepeters]

Hi Gary! The cracking is distressing, but as imafan said, certain varieties split more than others. This year about half of the perons I harvested have small splits, but none of the other varieties did. It is more common with the delicate kind, and is much more common here in AZ than the climates you are used to gardening in. You're not doing anything to cause this. You can try to reduce by the amount of cleavage by splitting your watering up so that you are giving the plants the same water volume, but in two sessions. This gives the top soil less opportunity to dry out, but honestly there's not much to be done. Hopefully you have timer, because it was 113 yesterday at 2 and I hate to think of you out gardening in that heat!