What are these abnormal tomatoes on my tomato plant?

Question

I have a few tomato plants growing in a raised bed. I grew them from seeds. For some reason a few of the tomatoes don't look normal (see pictures). Also the size of the fruit is much smaller than I expected. These are heirloom beefsteak tomatoes. I am in the San Francisco region.

Additional information - I am following crop rotation. I have 3 raised beds and last year I grew tomatoes in one of the adjacent beds. Also, these plants were started from seeds indoors and later transplanted to a larger pot and eventually to the raised bed.

Answer 1

This looks like blossom end rot. Here is another source of info.

According to the second link, which is from Clemson University:

After tomatoes are planted, gardeners can minimize the potential for blossom end rot by doing the following:

Once transplants become established, encourage the production of a large root system by keeping plants a little on the dry side for a few weeks (until they begin to flower and set fruit). A large root system is better able to take up the calcium needed for the healthy development of the tomato fruit. After fruit set begins, keep soil evenly moist. (Avoid extreme fluctuations in moisture levels. Do not overwater!) Apply a layer of mulch to help maintain even moisture and keep soil cooler. Do not overfertilize. Especially avoid high-nitrogen fertilizer as it can cause problems with the uptake of calcium. Do not cultivate closer than 1 foot to plants to avoid damaging roots. If tomatoes develop blossom end rot, spray the foliage with calcium chloride or calcium nitrate when symptoms first appear. Follow the instructions on the label. Removing fruit with symptoms is also recommended.

Answer 2

Definitely blossom end rot, here's another example of one from my garden. Several of these poor fruits had that characteristic dead brown scaly looking end. Some on my plant had their ends dry out, others took over like yours.

Answer 3

Went out to the internet to look for early blight early blight picturesand gee, bummer, this is what I think you have. Take a look, please send pictures. If this is what you have you HAVE to pull up all your tomatoes and I'd bury them in a place far from your garden and your neighbors. Next year you will NOT be able to plant tomatoes, eggplant, potatoes (any of the solanaceae family) in the same soil or anywhere near those beds for at least two years? If this is what you've got, this fungus as well as late blight is your worst nightmare. All of the tomatoes that were set are all infected. The entire plant is infected. What happens is ONE spore gets caught up in a splash of water, lands on a leaf/stem of the tomato and the ENTIRE PLANT is infected. There is NOTHING one can do about it...nada. I learned the hard way and lost 75 feet of 4' high gorgeous tomatoes...the black spots started and in 3 days the entire 3 rows of 25' heavily laden once healthy tomatoes were black. This was late blight. I learned early blight is very similar. I harvested all the tomatoes right away, even the green and in another week every single tomato was black. Ugh, tears, so sad!! I did a project as a Master Gardener in our test gardens and covered tomatoes with row cloth, another group with plastic, another I pruned off all the lower leaves, and I also mulched with straw another with chips. The only one that made it was the plastic covered with drip irrigation. Just one spore, one raindrop and the tomato plant was DONE. Rotating crops is critical! Please tell us what you've done, did you have tomatoes in the same soil last year? Where it is that you live? Are your neighbors growing tomatoes, have they had the same problem? Your soil might have been infected from your neighbors. Perhaps it came in the soil from store bought tomato starts? This is an expensive way to learn for sure. Gardeners always have to go through this kind of training otherwise, one is just a book learned gardener that just will never understand and will keep making mistakes. Silver lining and all that!!