Why? are the leafs on the bottom on my tomato plant turning yellow but the rest of the plant is health looking

Question

Its just the frist couple branches on each of my 2 diffrent tomato plants. Thier in 5 gallon buckets 75% full of fertlizer . Thier about 3ft tall with severel good looking tomatos on them and new flower blosooms everywhere!

Answer 1

Could be they are shaded out by the upper foliage or could be a disease trying to take over.  I always go with the happier answer and assume they have been shaded out by the foliage and let it go.  It's normal for some leaves to die off during the growing season.  Still, keep an eye out for more serious problems like insects and it's a disease, you can't do anything about it anyway........so avoid splashing muddy water from the ground onto the plants and have a good tomato crop.

Answer 2

Fertilizer has a lot of nitrogen in it. the plant might be getting to much and in the heat it can burn the plant. Put more soil in the pots.

Also if you have tomatos on the plant they are pulling all of the nutrients from the plant to grow.

Answer 3

Lower branches yellow and die off as fruiting begins. These lower leaves are the oldest and are just worn out and are of little use to the plant now.

Answer 4

because the plants putting it's energy into fruiting, so don't worry. you need to be feeding it with tomato food about once a week. just take the yellow leaves off and compost.

Answer 5

take scissors and cut off the branch,it won't hurt then you will have a totally green plant they all do it could the branch is at the end of it's life span,too much/little/ water/fertilizer some of these hybrids are determinant ,die of old age,some run right to frost,it might be a sign of death ahead  .............tom