tobaccotalk.myfastforum.org

highball · Joined: 23 Jul 2009 Posts: 9

jt

Dan · Posted: Sat Jul 25, 2009 2:27 pm Post subject:

jk, You keep a neat garden. Those seedlings may give you something but like you say, you were going to throw them out anyway.
Here are some seedlings I threw out a month ago. I tossed them into my pile of coal ash. Look at these buggers. I can't believe they are growing out of straight coal ash. I tell people that once you get these plants up 8 to 9 inches or so you can run over them with a truck and they don't die. Now I can say that you can just toss them, don't even plant them, in a pile of coal ash and they'll grow.

The worms, sheesh. I had three worms (the big green ones) so far. They tore up one of my #9's. Greedy suckers. Haven't seen any for a couple of weeks.

highball · Joined: 23 Jul 2009 Posts: 9

highball · Joined: 23 Jul 2009 Posts: 9

The crop is in the barn.

bob_kemp · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2009 4:10 am Post subject:

Hi -

highball, nice looking leaves. What kinds of tobacco did you grow and how tall did the plants get? How many plants did you put in the ground?

Bob

highball · Joined: 23 Jul 2009 Posts: 9

Bob,
I had 7 different cigar varieties that came from Dan. #1, #6, #9, #12, #13, #16, and #19. The ones that I am sure of are that #16 is the Pennsylvania Red that the Amish plant, the #19 is some sort of Connecticut wrapper type, and #9 #12 #13 are Havanas. Perhaps Dan can fill us in on what the name of each variety really is. All told there are somewhere between 160 and 180 plants hanging. I have not took final stock yet. I still have a few late sets that might make something. All plants averaged nearly 6 feet in height with exception of the Penn Red that did not get much above 4. The Red has nearly as many leaves as all the rest, but is a much more compact plant. The #12 was pretty much a failure due to low germination, but I had good luck with everything else. I'm very happy with this first year. Thanks.
Jeff

Dan · Posted: Tue Sep 15, 2009 1:03 pm Post subject:

Highball, Here's the story on the varieties. First let me explain how the numbers came about.
I originally bought all but the #5, 16, 18, and 19 seeds from a seed retailer. What I got in the packets was about 30 seeds in each. That's why I decided to sell seeds and put about 1000 in each packet. Now for the numbers. What I did is plant the few plants, that I got from these few seeds, in one row each. I numbered the rows 1 thru 20. Not knowing how many seeds come from a plant and not knowing that I would be selling seeds I let the names of the varieties go and kept the numbers of each row as identification. Of these 20 varieties I scrapped some because I didn't like the tobacco and some I had to scrap because of cross pollination. I wasn't aware of the cross pollination until I planted the next year. I had to get three years of each plant being true to it’s particular strain before I would sell seeds. By then I forgot completely what the official names of each variety was so I went with what I thought of each one.
As for #16 and #18 they are strains produced by the University of Pa. especially for local farmers. The #19 is Connecticut wrapper. The seeds were given to me some years ago. The #5 is something that I developed from cross pollination.
And that’s the rest of the story.

highball · Joined: 23 Jul 2009 Posts: 9

Sounds like as good a way to organize it as any. Thanks.
jk

bob_kemp · Posted: Thu Sep 17, 2009 5:35 am Post subject:

Hi --

Jeff, you said " The ones that I am sure of are that #16 is the Pennsylvania Red that the Amish plant"

Did you manage to bag the flowers on that plant to save the seeds? I've read that Penn red is a good tobacco for chew along with Black Mammoth. I have a lot of local customers for chewing tobacco seeds and I'd love to trade some silk leaf seed for Penn red.

Could you have someone you know (or yourself) who likes chew taste a bit of that Penn red and let me know what the flavor is like?

Bob

highball · Joined: 23 Jul 2009 Posts: 9

Bob,
Any leaf that I have is probably too new to be any good yet. Dan would know better than myself since I got the seed from him. It's possible that I don't know what the heck I'm talking about too... In any case I'm interested in learning everything I can about all this. I'm not a regular smoker-only a cigar once in a while. I do not know any folks that chew. This has caught my interest because the tobacco business reminds me somewhat of the bee business-which I was in for 30 years. There are similarities in the approach to both. Besides, it's always nice to have a project going and I'm contrary at heart. I figure if the government is trying to kill the industry, then that's a reason to keep it going. I don't like anybody telling me what's good or not good for me. I did not save seed from the #16 since I figured it would be easy to get locally. There's lots of Amish 10 miles north of me. I do have some from #6, #9, and #13 though, and leftover seed from the spring that I did not plant.
Jeff