Hail Damage to Vegetables

Jerry Brust, IPM Vegetable Specialist, University of Maryland; jbrust@umd.edu

It was not too much of a surprise to see some hail damage to vegetables after the storms that rolled through our area on Tuesday. The damage on tomatoes and onions that I saw was very characteristic of damage from pea-size hail (Figures 1 and 2). The damage to tomatoes was always one-sided or even a quarter of a side of the tomato that was not covered by foliage. There was some tomato damage to tomato foliage, but not much as the noticeable and important damage to the developing fruit. Onion leaves were more beat up, but the bulbs all looked good in the fields I visited. If you have not had a chance to check out your vegetables or fruit be sure to do so in the next few days to get an idea of how much if any damage occurred.

HailDamageTomato

Figure 1. Hail damage to tomato fruit, only one side of fruit damaged by pea-size hail

HailDamageOnion

Figure 2. Hail damage to onions