mr.greenjeans
Full Member
Posts: 22
Joined: Thu Mar 22, 2018 3:56 pm
Location: Central Iowa -Zone 5a

over fertilized my tomato seedlings

My tomato seedlings had developed their first set of real leaves so I decided it was time to fertilize. I misread the fine print on the fish emulsion and mixed a solution that was 6 times the recommended dose. The good news is I only added a teaspoon of the solution to each of the 7 seedlings. After a day I noticed that the leaves on 1 plant were curling a bit. That's when I read the instructions again and realized my mistake. I flooded the cells with water to try to dilute the soil. Today, day 2, I noticed a second plant is doing the same thing while the other plants look great. I gave them another dose of water again today. I'm only planting 4 plants so if the other plants stay healthy I should be OK. I think? My question is, will this cause un-reversible damage to the plants even if they survive and look healthy. I probably have time to start some more seeds as I don't put my plants out until the second or third week of May. Might be a good back up plan.
Thanks,
Dan

PaulF
Greener Thumb
Posts: 910
Joined: Tue Nov 09, 2010 5:34 pm
Location: Brownville, Ne

Dan, I think everything will be OK. Fish emulsion isn't strong enough to cause permanent damage. Tomatoes are pretty tough and should recover and do well once put into soil. As soon as your soil temperature gets warm enough the plants should recover and fully catch up. Fish emulsion is a fast acting nitrogen but also diminishes quickly.

Having lived in central Iowa for many years, my plant out date was the first week of May, unless it was still too cool for tomatoes. Never later than the second week, but then my garden was in south central Iowa. You should be OK.

mr.greenjeans
Full Member
Posts: 22
Joined: Thu Mar 22, 2018 3:56 pm
Location: Central Iowa -Zone 5a

Thanks for the reply, Paul. Since my post this morning, I noticed a couple of leaves on a third plant are curling a bit. All three plants that have curling leaves are Galahads (a new blight resistant variety). Coincidence? The other plants, 2 Brandywines and 2 Rutgers look fine so far. Just to be safe, I started 3 more Galahads this morning. Paul, I live about 20 miles North of interstate 80. It's usually the 2nd week of May but during cool Springs it can be the 3rd week of May.



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