How to confuse a smoker:
‘No, you can’t smoke out there, you have to smoke in here.’
Now conditioned to head straight outside when the urge to light up strikes, it’s quite difficult to get them to puff indoors. Things become even trickier when you try to explain it’s because of the tomatoes.
So once the fug had cleared I thought I’d double check if cigarettes really can seriously damage the health of tomato plants.
It would seem so.
The TMV virus is spread by contact.
Dried tobacco leaves in cigarettes and tobacco can carry the virus causing hands or clothing to become contaminated through contact so handling plants whilst smoking can spread the virus.
The virus doesn’t usually kill the plant but stunts it and is detrimental to the quantity and quality of the fruit.
The signs to look for are mosaic or mottled patterns of light green, dark green and yellow patches on the leaves.
As it doesn’t feature on the packet warnings click here for pictures of the virus.
