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Blossom End Rot on peppers

mega

mega

Blossom End Rot - it massacred my tomatoes last year, and a handful of peppers too. This year, it's already taken out 1/4 of the tomatoes and today, a pod off my treasured Italian Roaster II Hybrid.

Two questions:

- What causes BER?

- Is there anything that can be done about it?

I tried blossom end rot spray last year, which had the same impact as spraying water. Totally worthless. My understanding is that BER is related to a calcium deficiency, but I use TomatoTone for fertilizer, which has a fair amount of calcium in it.

I'm stumped. It's very depressing to find the BER on a pod you waited two months to get to near-ripe, only to see it ruined. There has GOT to be some way of minimizing the amount of BER in the garden.
 
Try this link for cause/cure for blossom end rot;

http://www.aces.edu/pubs/docs/A/ANR-1059/ANR-1059.pdf
 
Tomato-Tone is a good supplier of calcium and it is the soil. So the problem probably lies with uptake. Overfertilization and underwatering are the probable culprits. Soil Ph imbalances, excess nitrogen during fruiting and too much time between waterings will prevent calcium uptake.
 
You can blacken egg shells in a pan then grind them to a powder and soak in vinegar for about 2 weeks then strain the solution and pour/spray onto soil/plants. There are measurments but can't recall off hand, it may be even longer than 2 weeks also. Hope this helped.

EDIT: From my understanding you can also re-use the eggshells for another batch too.
 
I have read else where of using tums (or an off brand like product) and of people using a low concentrate dry milk.

Never used either of these myself though so I do not know how well or the dangers of this. I would think the milk would smell though.
 
Most of the time, as previously mentioned, ber happens not due to lack of calcium but due to the plants' inability to untake the calcium, and most often on the first flush of tomatoes. Overwatering is probably the major cause and consistant watering is often the best way to prevent it when/if possible. Also check your soil pH and make sure its not too acidic.
Trying to overcorrect the problem by adding extra calcium will likely just make things worse unless of course you know for sure you have a calcium deficiency
Also, milk (even powdered) is full of fat and not recommended for plants
 
Even with no other sources of calcium, Tomato Tone has 5% calcium so you should be fine. You have calcium in the soil. The problem is uptake. It's not getting through the roots. Inconsistent moisture levels is likely the problem. Although Potawie thinks it is overwatering, I tend to think it is underwatering. In either scenario, having the soil go to extremes (flooded to bone dry) prevents uptake. A layer of mulch will help keep soil moisture consistent.
 
Patience, it usually works itself out on it's own. I had that problem on my Toms and all my Bhuts last year, but it eventually went away and I didn't do anything special.
 
Hmm... thanks for all the input. I'm really stumped. With the TomatoTone in the soil it shouldn't be a calcium deficiency. As far as calcium uptake, they DEFINITELY haven't been underwatered. It was 97 to 100 degrees every day for the last 3 weeks; I had to water them everyday. I am thinking it's overwatering, but there was really no choice about the watering. However, it has cooled off a little in the last 2 days. I'm just going to let it ride and see how the situation develops from here. Last year, BER took out a huge huge amount of our tomato crop; it was very frustrating.
 
Do you use a mulch? Mulches should help hold in water making soil moisture levels more consistant. Also once again check your soil pH especially if this is a re-ocurring problem
 
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