The disease problems occur because disease spores which are in the ground can splash up on leaves while you're watering or there's a rainstorm. Spores land on the the leaves, they'll take hold and then begin to infect the plant.

What I do is take a small watter bottle, cut off the base and toss out the cap, then use it to encase the transplanted seedling. You have to screw the bottle down into soil a bit to anchor it so it won't blow a way in a strong wind. The bottles greatly limit splashups while the seedling is still very small, they also deter hungry snails, slugs, cutworms, critters and birds. Once the seedling has grown so large that it's leaves touch the sides of the bottle you remove the bottle. After that you can safely mulch the soil. Transplanting Tomatoes, scroll down for photos.

I use grass clippings and add a couple of inches which isn't thick enough to mat down and sour, it usually dries before it rots. It's always good, I think, to have a layer of mulch under your tomato plants or all plants in the garden. The mulch keeps wind from drying the soil and can greatly limit soil backsplash on the plants.

Anthracnose and Septoria are two diseases that are spread by backsplash (you may or may not have these diseases in your soil, but better safe than sorry.) At the garden center you can find fungicides which control, but not prevent, a host of tomato and other plant afflictions--there are organic and non-organic products. Fungicides and other plant disease treatments rarely cure a plant, instead they just delay the inevitable.

The link below is to Tomato Problem Solver from TAMU--this is a wonderful photo reference tool. Anthracnose is in 'Ripe Fruit' and Septoria is in 'Leaf'.

T

Here is a link that might be useful: TAMU Tomato Problem Solver

Thanks for the link, Trudi. I had already planted out a few larger seedlings that have some true leaves, and covered each one with a 2 liter soda bottle. So it sounds like I am on the right track.

Most of the tomatoes will be in a raised bed which will require a thick layer of newspaper under at least a couple inches of mulch to stay cool enough. So maybe that will be enough protection from the soil.

That will work.

T