Tomatoe Blooms Dying

by Bridgette Newell
(Meridian, Id USA)

All of my tomatoe plants this year have been growing great the plants look wonderful execpt for when they bloom the bloom will die and no fruit will be produced what should I do and is this something that I can fix?Thank you for your time

Bridgette

Doug says that if the blooms are dying - this means they're not being pollinated. Generally, we can blame cold weather for this happening in the spring (the pollen isn't alive once it gets too cold). Because tomatoes are wind-pollinated as much as insect pollinated, it's not usually a lack of insects such as bees.

Other than that - water stress "could" cause it - not enough water and the plant sheds blossoms to compensate.

But generally - on the home garden scale of things we're looking at cold temps that kill off the flowers.

Now that's assuming when the flowers fall off there's no small tomatoes forming behind them because that's what they do (some beginners don't know this). If this is the case, you'll see the bottom of the tomato flower (where it used to be) start to swell.

If the entire fruit set is falling off - stems and all - you have something like a chipmunk eating and picking away at them.

Hope that about covers the waterfront. Good luck with them.