About four years ago I had the idea of growing, fermenting, and rolling my own tobacco for cigars. Already a "cigar enthusiast" - I figured "if Carlos Fuente Jr. can grow wrapper leaf in the Dominican, and Rocky Patel can make his way just on passion and drive alone... I got a shot at doing this!"

So with a bunch of research and drive, I found a seller of Cuban tobacco seed, and ordered some.

The first time I tried - the seeds didn't sow the way I expected. So I researched some more, and checked the materials and conditions. They seemed just fine!

I then ventured and made some calls to the local green houses to get some ideas and answers. ( seek and you will find) The two biggest answers that they all gave me was "maybe their just no good?" or "maybe the seeds and plants just need to be acclimated to our climate?"

After the first attempt at sowing the seeds...I tried again, and again - this time they took.
However, I was able to save about 20% of the seedlings.
From those, I had to weed out the week ones, and baby the strong.

As those plants grew, a few more had died off. With the hand full of plants that I had - I grew them only for the seeds. (Because my summer only grants me a short amount of time to plant, grow and color cure the leaves - I found my timing had to be just right!)

After I saved the seeds from the one strongest plant, I threw the first set of seeds out.
The second set seemed to be much better, and with a better yield too. The plants were a little smaller than I hoped for and the leaves seem to be more thin and prone to burning from the sun. ( being that they were a sun grown plant, it just didn't make sense).

So with the few good leaves I could prime, I tried my hand at color curing. Lost most of them as well. ( I did manage to save some to age and try blending) Once again, I used the strongest plant I could harvest the seeds from... and started the process all over again the following year...this year!

As you see the plants are now big and healthy looking, with great blooms on them. "This is by far the best year I've had!"

After all this, I feel like I've gained experience, and become closer to the industry by farming and working the land... reaping what I've sown. Doing what they say can't be done!... what? Too far?

Now that I have a great working seed, I can now concentrate on curing and fermenting the leaves to the point of rolling and smoking my own cigars. I think the part I'm looking forward to the most is trying my hand at blending. (the art of creation)

Thanks for watching!

JJ Now

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