Tomato diseases and composting

StacyLou

I know that you are not supposed to throw diseased plants into the compost pile. I wonder if you allow the compost to get very hot, if that will destroy the disease, but I cannot say with certainty. I just asked my husband, and he thought that under certain conditions, such as a bigger compost pile, the type of materials in the compost pile, etc. that it might be able to kill the disease.

Hassena

@StacyLou

Hi there, do you have a particular disease in mind?

It's hard to say.

Tobacco Wilt virus plants should not be composted. It should be put in bag and tossed.

Powdery mildew-ed plants I compost, because it seems more seasonal. And it seems more susceptible to pants that are crowed and don't have good air flow.

Good question.

marjstratton

I've been concerned about powdery mildew. It does seem to be seasonal though. Maybe I'll just see what happens.

gardneto76

Great question. I often ponder what plants I can compost.

karenjanicki

I have heard that it's best to never compost a plant that has been affected by disease because the disease will live despite the heat in the compost pile and can still infect the plants the compost is used on. I would personally just discard or burn them.

Acequiamadre

VermontCathy

Tomatoes and potatoes are so disease prone that I never compost the plants, even if they don't show signs of disease. I pull them and toss them in the woods.

If you don't have a place on your property to dump plant material that you don't want to recycle back into the garden, you could throw them in the trash can, or create a separate "compost" pile that allows them to decompose, but never gets put back into the garden.