Anyone grow their own tobacco?

[GatorFarmer]

Apparently it once grew all over England, prior to James I (of King James Bible fame) leading a crusade of sorts against it. Imported from the new world, it became quite popular, being smoked mainly in clay pipes.

It is legal to grow for personal use in the United States, the ATF only being interested in those selling it.

17th century England was not exactly a warm and sunny place, so I find myself wondering if tobacco would not grow most places that its cousin the potato would.

Not wishing to construct a flue for curing, I would be limited to air drying.

I believe Southern farmers years ago used to plant rows for themselves.

Anyone ever try it?

 

[Erich]

I've got a Native American friend who gave me seeds for the punche (native tobacco) they grow up at his pueblo. I've not had a great deal of luck with it, but I've not worked too hard at getting it to grow, either. Thanks for reminding me.

If you have any interest, here's a link where you can buy seeds he provided to a seed-saving group:

Isleta Pueblo | Native Seeds/SEARCH

And here's their general tobacco seed selection:

Seeds > Tobacco | Native Seeds/SEARCH

 

[tobimaru]

When I was smoking briar pipes and various tobacco's I was interested in growing my own. I no longer smoke, but do collect pipes and memorabilia still. I have a LOT of "snuff" tobacco, crazy cool stuff.

You may be interested in the Tobacco University - https://www.facebook.com/tobacconistu?fref=ts

 

[tops]

We never growed backer but a lot of farmers do. Up until a few years ago in this area it was flue cured and the leaves are broke off the stalk and put in a building with heat. The last few years some are growing Burley which is air dried. The whole stalk is cut down and hung upside down in a shed until it dries then the leaves are broke off. I have heard a few old people that grew backer would mix some with their bought chewing backer and crush some to smoke. I mixed some with bought chewing tobacco one time and didn't like it. Tobacco when green has sticky gum which is hard to wash off. Larry

 

[kimporter]

it grows best in a high humidity climate,like here in ky,its also a pain in the rear to cure right,worked in my grandads patch many time

 

[venomballistics]

looked into doing so, but here in NE, we can only have something like 3 or 5 seeds.

But then, I discovered the vape scene, and have learned how to mix my own E juice

 

[MattO]

The guy across the street from us grew his own, and rolled his own. Although it must not have been tobacco because the police shut down his operation and he went to the big house..

 

[1morethan8]

The guy across the street from us grew his own, and rolled his own. Although it must not have been tobacco because the police shut down his operation and he went to the big house..

Funny thing, smoking tobacco can give you lung cancer..
I've read where smoking cannabis won't?

 

[redlevel]

My old Grandaddy used to grow some each year for
smoking and chewing. He helped me roll rabbit
tobacco smokes when I was a kid. He also made
moonshine likker when he was young.

 

[MattO]

Funny thing, smoking tobacco can give you lung cancer..
I've read where smoking cannabis won't?

Cannibas puts more tar in your lungs though. I don't know about causing cancer or not. That stuff is way over my head.

 

[rburg]

He also made
moonshine likker when he was young.

Now we're talking.

'Round hereabouts, if you want backy, you just keep watch on the patches. When they move it from the field after cutting, the roadsides are littered with leaves that have fallen off. Anyone who wants some can just stop and pick up pretty much what they want. We're not talking commercial quantities, but surely enough for personal use. Or enough to turn you a couple shades of green. You don't have control over growing conditions but you'd get a wide selection if you don't mind a little driving.

 

[venomballistics]

Funny thing, smoking tobacco can give you lung cancer..
I've read where smoking cannabis won't?

I hear a lot of the same, and they are not a group you'll find easy to talk sense to.

When burned, tobacco produces somewhere in the ballpark of 6000 chemical compounds.
of all those chemicals, about 40 are carcinogenic.
Most of these are combustion byproducts, common to burning virtually any plant material.
I don't think the heads are as immune as they would like to say.

tobacco or weed ... you smoke it for one particular agent, be it nicotine or THC.... in the end, it's the tar that kills you.

Enter vape, where your essentially sucking steam, you can have the nicotine free and clear of any of the tar.

 

[venomballistics]

Cannibas puts more tar in your lungs though. I don't know about causing cancer or not. That stuff is way over my head.

X ring hit right there.
and yeah ... thats where most of the carcinogens are ... in the tar.
The tar is also good for COPD, Emphysema, Peripheral artery, and pretty much every other smoking related issue.

Cannabis might be worse in this regard, but boy howdy do the heads ever slather it with BS trying to legalize it.

 

[ky wonder]

tobacco that is in most cigarette is a combination of more than one type of tobacco plant, and different grades of leaves that are ground up to get the specific taste of the product

here in ky we raised mostly air cured burley tobacco, but in other locations the norm was a fire cured varity

many of the old timers would build there own twist chewing tobacco from local grown tobacco

the tobacco plant is a labor intensive critter that take many hand on actions to get it to the user stage,

simply just dropping a seed into the ground will not produce the desired plant that you are looking for

I raised my last tobacco crop in 1983, and have not missed the work

 

[1morethan8]

Among the potential health risks associated with smoking marijuana, lung cancer has remained, by and large, at the top of the chronic toker’s concern list for many years. This unrest is mostly due to speculation surrounding the idea that regular marijuana smokers are in danger of suffering the same hazardous perils as long-term users of tobacco. A new study says this is not true.

A new study published in the latest edition of the International Journal of Cancer finds habitual pot smokers are at no greater risk of being inflicted with lung cancer than part-time stoners or even people who don’t smoke at all.

To make this determination, a team of researchers from the United States, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom set out to explore the records of several studies involving 5,000 participants. What they found was despite the tales of cannabis smoke causing lung cancer, there appeared to be very little reason to suspect weed use led to a greater threat of this disease.

“Results from our pooled analyses provide little evidence for an increased risk of lung cancer among habitual or long-term cannabis smokers,” wrote the study authors.

Incidentally, these findings are consistent with another study published last year in the scientific journal Annals of the American Thoracic Society, which found that while smoking marijuana could lead to an increased risk of chronic bronchitis, it did not lead to lung cancer.

 

[jubela#4]

Growing tobacco was the way we made our living until my Dad retired from it a few years ago then I got to quit doing it too. That made me happy as we would have 20-30 acres of the stuff every year. We grew burley here and as it has been said earlier we would cut the stalks and spear them on sticks and hang in a barn to air cure unlike flue cured which the leaves are stripped from the stalk in the field then hung in a barn and cure with fires.

I would think any tobacco you grew on your own would be rather harsh to smoke or chew unless you added some sweetening ingredients. I know I have tried to chew the stuff we grew at times and I didn't care for it so I stuck to Red Man.

 

[GatorFarmer]

Warnings on pipe tobacco merely state that it is known to the State of California to cause cancer or birth defects. However, this is similar to the warning related to lead that causes a huge number of products to require a label that states California knows it is bad for you. The best medical science circa 1957 suggested that smoking was not only harmless but actually good for you. Why none other than Ronald Reagan himself served to preach the virtues of a good carton of unfiltered king size Chesterfields as the perfect Christmas gift for all.

A casual perusal of anti tobacco efforts suggests them to be histrionic and to make the worst screeds of the old HCI against handguns seem almost rational. I also note that the same CDC that says guns are a health problem are the people promoting the idea that tobacco is bad. Thus naturally I can only assume that if the CDC and UN say it is bad, that it is fact good.

Regardless of whether someone chooses to smoke it, tobacco has long been grown as an ornamental. Sometimes an ornamental used to deter pests from other plants.

Tomatoes, Potatoes, and Egg Plant are in the same family. Anecdotal evidence suggests dried tomato leaves were used as snuff during the Great Depression.

I thought I would try growing some for use in pipe smoking. Before the wars of the 1990s, a lot of very fine tobacco was grown near Sarajevo and indeed throughout the Balkans. Thus the "seed" of an idea that I might be able to get it to grow in a mountain climate. I remember it grown ornamentally in Michigan, which the same USDA zone as Wyoming.

I am not familiar with limits on the number of seeds in parts of the country. As far as I know it is legal, and Amazon and Ebay and most any gardening catalog are a ready source of seeds.

 

[jubela#4]

A tobacco seed is tiny, I mean like the size of a mustard seed. Years ago when we grew our own tobacco plants in beds covered with cotton two teaspoons of seed would plant about 4-5 acres of tobacco.
Having said that you just can't put a seed in the ground and have it grow into a plant. They need to be sown in a bed like a lettuce bed then transplanted when they are big enough, like 8-10 inches high.

I'm pretty sure there would be no limits on the amount of tobacco you could grow for your personal use.

 

[Ky Cowboy]

I think the problem with raising your own has to do with the curing. Very little is known how commercial tobacco is cured. A pound of tobacco will produce about almost two and half cartons of cigarettes. An average tobacco plant will produce about a pound of tobacco. So some where between 50 - 100 plants will usually produce enough tobacco for home use. Four to five plants per stick, hung to air cure doesn't require a whole lot of space. After air curing, the tobacco, some say, is ready to smoke. But most find it to strong. There is another step called sweating that must be done. This process is a lot like a compost pile, where the leaves are stripped into hands and stacked on a basket. Wrapped in burlap and made to heat up to 115 degrees. Then the tobacco is unwrapped and re-stacked, re-wrapped and heated up again. This is done three times. This process converts the ammonias to sugars, thus creating a desirable leaf for smoking. Tobacco is to be stored in dry climate, observing for mold all the time. Leaf can be shredded with pasta cutter, and rolled into a cigarette. There is more to it than I listed, but anybody who worked tobacco knows pretty much everything up to this point. Tobacco is best raised organic, most chemicals used in farming carry over into the tobacco and this may be why so many carcinogens maybe in tobacco. Raising a good product is very laboring, but can be done at home.

 

[venomballistics]

Gator ... of late, its been coming out that the whole smoking debate is a mix of truths, lies and agendas.

Your probably right not to trust the CDC here.
They have been more interested in political advancement and population control than they have been about disease control.
Their brilliance through the Ebola crisis was evidence of this.

What is surfacing lately is that nicotine seems to have some beneficial effects relating to mental acuity and stress management.
Its no wonder that when the drama and trauma start, so does the need for a smoke.

The addiction is fairly complex, in that it is tied to how we manage stress which accounts for some of the long term issues with relapse after someone has quit. We all know life is not all sunshine and daisies, and that nicotine can be a good friend when its time to weather a storm.
The downside is that you can't smoke tobacco for that nicotine, without getting that blasted devils mix of tar.
The advent of the Ecig and the rise of the vapeing culture have managed to separate the tar from the nicotine and lead to a reassembly of data.
E juice is a 4 part mix.

Vegetable glycerine
Propylene glycol (not to be confused with diethylene glycol)
Nicotine
Flavoring

These are not burned, but rather boiled and rendered as steam.
the only wild card in the mix are some of the flavorings.
so far, staying clear of butter flavors is advised.
I would also advise avoiding any flavoring that gunks up wicks and coils.

IME, by using rebuildable atomizers and mixing my own juice, consumables to last about two years has set me back about as much as two cartons of smokes.
also IME ... saved proceeds have gone towards batteries, gunpowder and the occasional new mod or RDA as some of them are works of art.

Anywho, I figured I'd put some of this out there for those who can use it.