To further help you protect yourself as well as our surrounding community of growers, the UNH Cooperative Extension maintains a Late Blight and Information & Update page. It includes an online slide show, Late Blight 2010: Prevention, Identification & Management, and a list of prevention techniques: Late Blight: A Community Disease Ensure your garden is not a source of disease! Late blight persists in potato tubers • Search and destroy volunteer potato plants sprouting in the garden or compost pile (bag and place in the garbage). • Buy new potato seed from a source that can provide assurance they are disease free. • Do not plant potatoes left-over from last year’s infected crop or potatoes purchased from a grocery store. • Buy tomato transplants from a locally grown source that can provide assurance they are disease free. • Minimize leaf wetness by staking tomatoes, using good spacing and practicing good weed management. • If late blight occurs in your garden, remove affected tissue and promptly report to extension in your state.
As I work my way through tomatoes canned two years ago, I worry about being able to replenish them this coming season. Last summer’s attack of Late Blight, an air-borne fungal disease, destroyed tomato and potato crops throughout New England. One important step for home gardeners to take this year is to buy locally-grown tomato starts. This avoids the chance of importing infected plants from growers in southern states where Late Blight can overwinter.