PLEASE HELP MY POOR LITTLE TOMATO PLANTS

Elizabeth over at Garden Rant is offering a chance to ask "What's Wrong With My Plant?" and get an answer from experts, the authors of What’s Wrong With My Plant, David Deardorff and Kathryn Wadsworth.  Well I've been staring at my brand new Husky Cherry tomato plants and wondering if I should toss them in the garbage or plant them in my garden.  Picked up at Home Depot just over a week ago the seedlings looked fantastic:

But then I started noticing white areas on some of the leaves:

 

And they got bigger:

 

Until they looked like this:

 

Since last year's late blight arriving early in the Northeast was attributed to tomato plants sold at big box stores, I'm more than a little nervous about what this could be and am strongly considering just tossing the plants in the garbage (not the compost pile obviously).  Do I need to be worried or should I strip off the affected leaves and focus on the healthy new growth on top and just plant deep?

Comments

[Dad and Barb]

Take them back to the Depot. The "experts" there should be able to tell you what's wrong and you should at least get to pick new ones.

[Heather's Garden]

Dad and Barb -- That's not a bad idea, at least returning them and getting store credit. I think I may stick to tomatoes from a local nursery this year, depending on what the experts say about diagnosing these.

[vrtlaricaana]

Could it be the sun burns? Where do you keep them? I had similar situation with white spots. It turned out that there was water on leaves + direct sun = sunburned.

[mummer]

It could very well be sunburn. My Early Girl
plant had, and has similar leaf ?wilt? yet produces like crazy. Have you had any unseasonably bright days?

[Layanee]

Heather, I think that these tomatoes were not 'hardened off' and you have burned them or the cold has affected them. No tomatoes until mid-May! Never trust HD?

[Frank Hyman]

I use to be an IPM scout for tomato farmers and it looks like sun scorch,

I would plant them and not worry about it. You don't toss out the children when they get sunburn, do ya ? Plants want to grow even if they get a few scratches, etc.

Frank Hyman
www.liberatedgardener.net
Because it's easier to enjoy your garden if you're not enslaved by it.

[Heather's Garden]

Well I have the smartest readers ever! You were correct, just a simple case of sunburn. Check out the diagnosis from the experts on Garden Rant: http://www.gardenrant.com/my_weblog/2010/04/creeping-white-death-srsly.html