How to properly grow tobacco at home?

A plant like tobacco is not difficult to grow, but after harvesting it, fermentation is not a very fast process. But this is also possible at home, and smoking tobacco grows almost everywhere, even in the Siberian garden. Growing tobacco at home on a windowsill is also not too troublesome for a beginner. The main thing is to provide him with proper care and conditions in the apartment.

Conditions for growing tobacco Additional lighting for tobacco

Before sowing tobacco on the balcony, you should remember that the plant is very picky about the choice of land, loves warm temperatures, but despite this it is unpretentious.

For scented tobacco, the content of minerals and salts in the soil, the presence of fresh air and heat are very important. Different plant conditions can affect the shade of the leaves and their length. And the aroma of smoking tobacco will depend on the humidity.

back to content ↑ Lighting

The plant prefers bright areas in the apartment with a lot of light and heat, so growing on the balcony in the warm season will be an ideal condition.

Temperature regime

The most ideal temperature for growing seedlings or the plant itself on a window is considered to be a temperature of 25 to 28 degrees Celsius. At lower temperatures, seedlings and mature plants of scented tobacco can stop growing or even die altogether.

Capacity

In order to grow seedlings, the container must be large, this is mainly done in greenhouses or greenhouses. And at home, it is recommended to use a seedling box or a large pot; with strong thickening, a pick of plants is done.

Tobacco soil and fertilizer

The plant is planted in sandy loam soil with an abundance of potassium and nitrogen. It quickly pumps out all the nutrients from the soil. Therefore, scented tobacco must be fertilized often, doing it with mullein or bird droppings. If necessary, the soil is limed.

The optimal substrate for growing tobacco is soil with humus, garden soil and sand. They are mixed in a ratio of 2 to 1 to 1.Additionally, before planting seeds, the soil must be well watered.

They begin to feed the plant after planting on seedlings with the help of a slurry of manure and superphosphate. It can be processed using sulfur powder.

When the first inflorescences appear, the plant is treated with a solution of onion peels or garlic tincture.
A week after the first treatment, the bushes are once again treated with onion-based tincture. The third feeding takes place after another 7 days.

back to content ↑ Plant formation

Before growing a plant on the balcony, you need to properly prepare the seeds for planting. First of all, they are soaked on a wet cloth soaked in an antiseptic and left on the cloth for 24 hours. In this way, seed germination will increase.

After that, the seeds are washed, laid out on a saucer, and removed to a warm, bright place. The fabric is moisturized and sprouts await. The sprouts should not be larger than the size of the grains themselves, otherwise they will quickly break down and the plants will not take root and grow well.

Plants are transplanted after smoking tobacco has released at least 4 leaves. Before transplanting, the seedlings are watered and planted together with an earthen clod in a separate pot so as not to damage the root system.

It is recommended to plant seedlings in prepared holes, which are heavily spilled with water, a depression is made in them in the middle. Sprinkle the hole with wet soil on top, put a seedling in the hole and carefully sprinkle the root system with dry soil. This procedure will allow the roots to take root better and not lose moisture.

When the tobacco blooms, it needs to break off the inflorescences and remove the extra side shoots from time to time.

back to contents ↑ Planting instructions and care

Tobacco seeds remain viable for a long time, and therefore old seeds can also be used for planting. They will rise as quickly as fresh.
If the seeds are planted for seedlings to be planted later in the garden, then the age of the plants should be 40-45 days.

The planting principle, regardless of the future location of the plants and the planting site, is identical: the seeds are scattered over the soil, the soil is preliminarily watered. The maximum seed placement depth should not be more than 8mm.
They are slightly pressed into the soil, and lightly watered so that the soil does not erode, and the seeds do not sink into the soil.

It is better to germinate tobacco on a damp cloth beforehand so that the seeds have germinated sprouts. So, if you plan to get seedlings, you can get it faster by 7-8 days. For planting and good shoots, you need a temperature above 25 degrees. When tobacco grows, the gardener needs to loosen it often, weed, water and fertilize as needed.

In order to calculate the amount of fertilizer, you can focus on the amount of fertilizer for one tomato bush.

Tobacco is watered infrequently, even on hot days it is enough to water it 3 times a summer, but at the same time watering should be abundant. Better to let the plant suffer a lack of water than overflows. Their root system is powerful and the plant can take moisture from the soil for a long time. But before you pluck it and ferment it, the tobacco is well watered with settled warm water.

back to content ↑ Varieties of tobacco

There are several types of tobacco that can be successfully grown on a balcony or window.

• Variety "Kubanets". The average number of suitable leaves for processing is about 27 pieces. The time from planting the seeds to breaking it varies from 103 to 134 days.
• Meal 92. He practically does not get sick, ripens quickly (about 98 days pass from planting to breaking).
• Samsun 85. These bushes mature quickly and have a large number of leaves suitable for further processing (there are about 50 of them per bush).
• Jubilee new 142. Ripens quickly (time from planting seeds to breaking is about 78 days). Nicotine in the leaves of this variety is from 2% to 2.1%. Unpretentious and practically does not get sick with diseases inherent in tobacco.
• Holly 316. The cultivar has a long growing season.It has a low nicotine content.

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Growing tobacco at home

Growing tobacco, in general, the matter is not difficult, you just need to follow the rules of agricultural technology. It should be noted right away that tobacco is a thermophilic plant and the southern regions are most suitable for its cultivation.

Quite common are only a few types of tobacco, all of them are of no decorative value and most of them are grown rarely and only by amateurs.

Sticky tobacco

The plant is about a meter high, and as the name suggests, all parts of the plant are covered with a sticky bloom. This tobacco is very similar to country tobacco. The plant smells very unpleasant, with both flowers and leaves and stems.

A very expressionless plant, usually used in group plantings as a background for other plants. It blooms with tubular flowers of yellowish-green color, the flowering period is long - from June to September.

Fragrant tobacco

This plant has a pleasant aroma that can be felt at dusk. It has white tubular, rather large flowers, on the outside in red strokes. For the day, the flowers close and open only at dusk.

Smoking or Virginia tobacco

This type of tobacco is an annual plant that grows naturally only in South America. Here it can reach a height of 3 meters. Plants are not branched or slightly branched, depending on the variety.

The size and number of leaves on the plant also depend on the variety. The flowers of this species are tubular, pink or red, collected in paniculate inflorescences.

 

The main value of the species is the size, thickness and number of leaves on plants. There are quite a large number of varieties and hybrids of this species.

It is also worth noting that this type of tobacco undergoes a fermentation procedure before use, so that the leaves reveal their aroma.

Rustic tobacco

This species is called makhorka by the common people. Annual plants, in nature grow only in North America.

Plant height usually does not exceed 100-120 cm, flowers are yellow-green, stems are more branched than smoking tobacco.

Makhorka is a more unpretentious look and its leaves contain more nicotine than virgin tobacco.

Smoking tobacco varieties

The most common are the following varieties of tobacco: Virginia, Bryansk Large-leaved, Holly, Samsun, Cigar and Jubilee.

The cultivation technique for Virginia tobacco and for makhorka is the same, both species are grown in seedlings.

A greenhouse and a greenhouse are also suitable for growing seedlings, and besides, there is also a warm windowsill, here you can grow seedlings in a well-drained planting box or just a flower pot.

To grow tobacco seedlings, a nutritious substrate should be prepared; it is best to take natural fertilizers such as horse or cow dung.

But fresh fertilizers should not be applied, humus will be ideal. The ideal substrate is a substrate made up of two parts of humus, one part of the regular soil from your plot, and one part of sand.

Before sowing, the substrate must be moistened.

You can sow dry seeds, but more friendly seedlings will be obtained if the seeds are germinated.

 

For germination, seeds should be wrapped in a clean cloth or gauze 4-5 days before sowing and soaked in clean warm water.

For better germination, you can add several crystals of potassium nitrate to the water.

In such a solution, the seeds should be kept for about a day, then rinse them well with water and put them on the same cloth. Put the cloth in an enamel or earthenware dish, put the container in a warm place, do not cover the seeds or dishes.

The cloth must be moistened in a timely manner.

Approximately on the third - fourth day, the seeds will begin to hatch, wait another day and you can plant the seeds in the soil, do not allow the sprouts to regrow too much, otherwise they may break off.

Seeds can be sown one at a time, or they can be dried and mixed in dry sand and sown in bulk. The sowing depth of seeds should not exceed 0.5 cm.

After sowing, the seeds are covered with a layer of sand mixed with humus in a ratio of 3: 1. Watering the seeds should be done very carefully so as not to erode the topsoil.

It is best to use a spray bottle for watering. Also, do not allow stagnation of water and overflow of soil.

If you are using a seedling box or flower pots for growing seedlings, or if the seeds are sown too close to each other, you will need to carry out such a procedure as picking.

 

A pick should be carried out when 3-4 true leaves appear on young seedlings.

Before picking, water the seedlings well and when the soil gets wet well, you can carefully transplant the plants into a greenhouse or separate pots for further growth and development.

The tobacco plant, like all other cultivated plants, should be fertilized for better growth. The following fertilizers can be used for feeding:

In 10 liters of water, you need to dissolve 30 grams of ammonium nitrate, 20 grams of sulphate or potassium chloride and water the plants with this solution.

In 10 liters of water, you need to dissolve 1 kg of chicken manure and leave the solution to ferment for two weeks, stirring occasionally.

After the solution has fermented, it can be used to fertilize young plants, but only before watering it should be diluted.

Adding 4-5 liters of water to 1 liter of solution.

Transplanting to a permanent place in the ground should be started only when the threat of late spring frosts has passed and the soil warms up well.

If you grow tobacco in a greenhouse after picking, you do not need to replant it anymore.

 

Already matured plants with a height of 14 to 16 cm should be planted in the ground, already having 5-7 true leaves and a stem about 0.5 cm thick.

A week before the planned transplant, the seedlings need to be hardened, reducing watering and accustoming the plants to open air and sunlight.

Before transplanting, about 2-3 days, watering the seedlings is stopped, and watered abundantly only 2-3 hours before transplanting.

Plants are carefully removed from the soil and placed in pre-prepared holes. About half a liter of water should be poured into these holes.

Make a recess in the center of the hole with a peg and put a plant in it, then sprinkle the roots with moist soil and crush it well, and sprinkle the plantings with dry soil on top.

This procedure helps to retain moisture near the roots for much longer.

For the whole season, it will be enough to carry out three dressings. The first feeding is carried out immediately after transplanting the plants into the ground.

The second feeding is needed two to three weeks after the first, and the third, respectively, two to three weeks after the second. For feeding, you can take a solution of chicken manure or any complex fertilizer. How to dilute the fertilizer is indicated on its packaging.

Caring for tobacco plants is reduced to regular weeding and loosening of the soil near the plants.

Growing tobacco at home

Growing tobacco at home, despite the general trend towards smoking cessation, is gaining in popularity.

The thing is that tobacco ground into dust is an effective natural remedy for pest control.

In addition, some recipes of traditional medicine recommend the use of tobacco leaf in the manufacture of medicinal products for external use. Therefore, for many gardeners, the question is relevant: how to grow tobacco at home?

Having decided to start growing tobacco at home, you should definitely take into account that the taste characteristics of the product depend on the area and soil where the culture grows.

For example, the texture of the leaves of a plant grown in soils with low moisture levels and minimal mineral salts will be very fine and the tobacco will be odorless.

And, conversely, bushes grown on silty or clay soil will have small leaves, but dense and fragrant.

Growing tobacco from seeds at home

Contrary to the fears of newcomers, growing tobacco at home is not difficult. It is important to make the right choice of crop variety.

For warmer regions, where tobacco is traditionally cultivated, almost all plant varieties are suitable; in a temperate climatic zone, varieties "Trapezond 15", "Sigarny 17" and "Bryanskiy 91" are recommended for breeding.

For a personal plot, the Trapezond 15 and Trapezond Kubanets tobacco varieties are perfect, which ripen in 3-3.5 months, which is almost a month earlier than the ripening of other varieties.

How to plant tobacco seedlings?

As for any crop that requires a long period with a warm temperature for growing, it is more expedient for tobacco to use the seedling method of growing.

Planting of tobacco for seedlings is carried out at the end of March - at the beginning of April. You can sow dry seed, but agricultural technicians assure that the hatched seeds grow better.

 

To do this, 4 - 5 days before planting, the seeds, wrapped in a cloth, are soaked in warm water diluted with a few drops of tartaric acid. Soaking time is a day.

The procedure shortens the period of forcing by almost a week, has a beneficial effect on further vegetation and increasing yields.

Then the seeds are washed and placed on a damp cloth in an enamel (faience) dish in a warm place. Make sure the cloth is wet at all times.

When the seeds hatch on the 3rd - 4th day, they are dried and mixed with clean sand or humus. Seeds are sown in pots or wooden boxes with nutritious soil, while the planting depth is 0.5 - 0.8 cm.

After planting, the soil is watered from a spray bottle.

When growing tobacco seedlings, it is important to observe the watering regime: it is necessary to water little by little, but daily.

It is advisable to pick seedlings at the "ears" stage, when 3 - 4 true leaves appear. 2 times feed seedlings with mineral fertilizers or infusion of chicken manure.

A week before planting in the ground, the seedlings are hardened with air and the number of watering is reduced.

Planting tobacco seedlings

When the height of the seedlings reaches approximately 15 cm, and the number of leaves increases to 5 -6 (this number does not include cotyledonous leaves), the seedlings can be planted in open ground. In this case, it is necessary that warm weather has already been established.

A furrow is prepared in advance, holes are made in it. Half a liter of water is poured into each hole, the hole is deepened with a peg, and a bush is vertically inserted into it. The wet earth is pressed against the roots, and dry soil is poured on top so that less moisture is lost.

During the growing season, regular loosening of the earth, watering and weeding should be carried out. Fertilizing tobacco is carried out in the same way as fertilizing tomatoes. When flowers appear, the inflorescences break off. It is also necessary to systematically carry out pinching - removal of side shoots.

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Growing tobacco at home as a business

Modern industrial tobacco cannot be called 100% high quality and corresponding to its value. That is why more and more people are thinking about starting a home tobacco growing business. We will talk about how to do this today.

Our business valuation:

• Initial investment - from 10,000 rubles.
• Market saturation is low.
• The complexity of starting a business is 3/10.

The best varieties of tobacco for growing in central Russia

The first thing to do is to select the varieties of tobacco. Please note that not all of them are suitable for smoking. You should not use those that have not been tested and not approved for the preparation of smoking mixtures.

The best varieties of tobacco for growing in central Russia:

• Refectory 15;
• Refectory 219;
• Ternopil 14;
• Holly 215
• Anniversary;
• Kentucky Burleigh.

The latter belongs to the varieties of tobacco that do not require fermentation - the leaves of the Kentucky Burley are steamed and divided into parts immediately after drying. (about the fermentation of tobacco at home will be discussed later).

And varieties of makhorka:

• Datura 4;
• Pekhlets 4;
• Pekhlets local.

You can buy smoking tobacco and makhorka seeds at a specialized outlet or in an online store. The latter is especially true for residents of small settlements. The goods will be delivered by a transport company or "Russian Post" in a few days.

The most appreciated is tobacco, which is made not from one, albeit the most expensive, variety, but from several. And makhorka is complemented by St. John's wort or sweet clover.

Growing conditions of tobacco

The main plus of tobacco is that it is unpretentious, i.e. is able not only to survive, but also to give an excellent harvest in almost any part of our country. But he, like all other plants, will be better in the south.

Do not despair if you cannot change your place of residence and start a business, for example, in Krasnodar. The problem is solved, and very simple.

It is enough to build or rent a room with heating or a greenhouse.

In other words, the conditions for growing tobacco in the garden - in the open air, without additional systems, can be created only in the south.

 

As for the soil, it must be saturated with moisture. Give preference to chernozem, loamy or sandy loam soil, which contains a lot of both moisture and nutrients - calcium, potassium and nitrogen.

Let's consider in more detail the technology of growing tobacco from seeds.

Tobacco growing technology

The technology of growing tobacco is no different from the technology of growing tobacco. Therefore, it is not possible, and even necessary, to plant both crops together.

Planting tobacco seeds begins with soaking them - not in water, but in a solution of tartaric acid at a temperature of 27 degrees Celsius for 24 hours.

It is very important to maintain the temperature, as it provides better and faster growth for about a week. Ratio: for 1 gram of seeds, 3 milliliters of tartaric acid solution.

This is done due to the fact that tobacco and makhorka seeds are characterized by low germination and susceptibility to diseases.

After a day, the seeds need to be dried a little and put in a bowl - if there is, then in a ceramic one, but it is possible in an enamel layer with a layer of 2 - 3 centimeters. Leave them on for a couple of days, slightly moistening and stirring several times a day. The temperature remains the same, 27 degrees Celsius.

Next, we prepare the soil. We take three parts of humus and one part of sand and mix until the most homogeneous state.

 

And we plant tobacco and tobacco seeds: for every 10 square meters of soil, 4 grams of tobacco to a depth of 0.3 centimeters and 20 grams of tobacco to a depth of 0.7 centimeters.

And the last question: when to sow tobacco seeds for seedlings? The optimal time is late February-early March.

Growing tobacco seedlings

Growing seedlings of tobacco and makhorka is possible only with proper watering. Increase the volume of water from 1 to 4 liters, depending on how much the plant has grown.

At the same time, you also need to, little by little, reduce the temperature from 27 to 20 degrees Celsius.

A good harvest will not come out without top dressing. For tobacco, you can use one of the following recipes:

1. Superphosphate, nitrate and potassium salt, 50 grams, 30 grams and 20 grams, respectively, for 1 regular bucket of water. For every 1 square meter of seedlings, there are 2 liters of fertilizing.
2. Chicken manure at the rate of one part chicken manure to 7 parts water. The consumption is exactly the same.

A week before planting tobacco seedlings in open ground, you should reduce watering, and stop it 3 days before. The last saturation of the crop with moisture before planting in a heated room or greenhouse should be done at least 2 hours in advance.

If the technology of growing tobacco was followed "from" and "to", then the plant will have strong and, despite this, elastic stems half a centimeter thick and up to 15 centimeters high, as well as 2 or 3 leaves.

Planting seedlings of smoking tobacco in open ground

Planting seedlings of smoking tobacco in open ground should be in the area that is on the slope. Excess water will drain from it. But it should not be very high, otherwise the soil will go away along with the excess water.

In no case should the soil be processed with a tractor or other equipment, only manually, with a plow, due to which the maximum loose consistency will be obtained - just what is needed.

Work on open ground is allowed if its temperature is 10 degrees Celsius or more at a depth of 10 centimeters. As a rule, it is April-May, in the south - earlier.

Planting of tobacco seedlings is carried out with a distance of 20 - 25 centimeters between bushes and with an interval of 70 centimeters between rows.

Before putting the tobacco seedlings in the hole, it is necessary to pour half a liter of water into it, and dip the culture itself in a mixture of cow dung and clay. At the end, the entire plantation is watered.

In the process of growth, the plant needs to be weeded out, loosened and fed. Also, tobacco care involves pinching and edging. Let's dwell on these procedures.

Stepping

Different varieties of tobacco have a different number of stepchildren (there are also those varieties of tobacco that do not have stepchildren). They appear between the leaves after flowering. It is worth removing them when the size is from 1.5 to 2 centimeters.

Before that, it does not make sense, since there is a high probability of re-growth.

Shaping

Edging, as well as pinning, allows you to increase the number of sheets by several times. It is the cutting of flowers that have not yet blossomed.

The peculiarity of edging is that it leads to an increase in the content of nicotine. Do not forget about this when deciding on the procedure.

Diseases of tobacco and makhorka and methods of their treatment

The most common diseases of tobacco and makhorka include:

1. Rotting stems and leaves.
2. Mosaic disease.
3. Powdery mildew.
4. Ryabukha.

Decay of stems and leaves can be identified by a colorless spot with a white bloom, in which blackening nodules form after a few days.

The cause of this disease is an increased amount of moisture. So keep it dry and don't over-water it.

A symptom of mosaic disease is slightly white and green spots that can be seen with the naked eye. Over time, they turn yellow, the rest of the plant becomes brown, the leaves become wavy.

 

Since this disease is contagious, firstly, do not allow diseased and healthy plants to grow close to each other and, secondly, do not increase the volume of manure.

Powdery mildew attacks the leaves, they acquire spots and white bloom and wither. Treatment consists of spraying with sulfur, sulfur-based antifungal compounds, or baking soda.

Pockmarked is spoken of by large, clear-edged spots of white or, conversely, brown. Holes can form in their place.

This disease is caused by a lack of nutrients in the soil and sharp fluctuations in air temperature. Therefore, irrigate and fertilize the soil regularly and plant tobacco in a heated room or greenhouse if you live in an area with frequent weather changes.

Thus, proper tobacco care is 100% disease-free.

Harvesting and drying of tobacco

You can start harvesting tobacco after the first leaves turn yellow. This is done from the bottom up. Ripening of tobacco occurs after 4 months, and tobacco - after a little more than 2 months.

Tobacco drying can be divided into three parts:

1. First of all, the leaves of the plant are laid in a layer of 20 - 30 centimeters and left in the fresh air in the shade for half a day.
2. Then they are tied with a rope and put away in a dry and well-ventilated room. This can be a terrace and a shed. They stay there for 2 weeks.
3. Finally, the tobacco is transferred indoors. Remains in it until autumn.

Now let's move on to the conditions for the fermentation of tobacco.

Fermentation of tobacco

Fermentation of tobacco makes it an order of magnitude better and more aromatic. To do this, take its now dried leaves and put them in a container that is not damaged at high temperatures.

To ferment tobacco:

1. Warm up the culture to a temperature of 50 degrees Celsius and create a humidity of 65%. Leave the plant for 3 days.
2. Next, at the same temperature, lower the humidity to 75%. Leave the plant for another 7 days.
3. Then lower the temperature and increase the humidity to 80%. Gradually, within 2 days.
4. Continue to lower the temperature to 20 degrees Celsius and now lower the humidity to 15%.

Fermented tobacco should be left to rest for 1 month. And only then can they be cut into strips.

Yes, this procedure is not easy, it requires precision and endurance. But fermented leaf tobacco is also valued more than unfermented tobacco.

Financial question

In order to understand whether the described business is profitable or not, we will make calculations. Let's take a plot of land with an area of ​​10 acres. It will need 400 grams of tobacco seeds, which will yield from 200 to 400 kilograms of the finished product.

The cost of tobacco is about 2,000 rubles per kilogram, and makhorka is about 500 rubles per kilogram on the wholesale market.

The proceeds from the sale of tobacco will be up to 800 thousand rubles, and tobacco - 4 times less, up to 200 thousand rubles. And the profit is influenced by the price of seeds.

It is very difficult to assess the payback of the business we are considering, since someone will buy or rent a room with heating or a greenhouse, purchase equipment, and someone will manage with "improvised means" - a handmade greenhouse, an attic instead of a special dryer, etc. ... The approximate payback period, in other words, the return on the money invested in the home tobacco growing business is from 2 to 3 years.

Organization of product sales

There are several ways to organize the sale of products, including opening a small retail outlet such as a tent near your home or making an online store.

In both the first and second cases, you will need to seek the help of a lawyer. The fact is that tobacco is one of the goods that must have certificates and excise taxes. Without them, the sale is illegal.

You are now familiar with the basics of a tobacco growing business, including where to buy tobacco seeds.

Growing tobacco at home

April 1st.

So the beginning of the new season of growing tobacco at home in 2017 has come.

I will describe here superficially, but read in more detail in the article how to grow tobacco.

Tobacco seeds are sown in food containers

This year, I have planted only two varieties, they are Kentucky barley and aromatic. I did not sow more varieties, I like these.I collected seeds of Kentucky Barley in 2012, they are 5 years old, at the same time let's see the percentage of germination. We are waiting for seedlings.

April 5.

Yesterday, with the emergence of seedlings, I transferred the seedlings to a colder windowsill and began to light up the seedlings. The glass was sealed with cellophane from direct sunlight.

Kentucky gave about 95% of seedlings, this is an excellent result.

The aromatic began to show cotyledon leaves, well, this is understandable, he is an earlier variety of tobacco than Kentucky.

He also began constant airing by sliding the greenhouse lid by 1 centimeter. We don't need mold on tobacco seedlings.

April 9th.

The seedlings are doing well. I removed the covers from the greenhouses completely, the tobacco adapted to the dry air in the apartment.

This is how it looks now:

 

Nothing stretches, which means everything is fine with lighting. At the same time, I will conduct an experiment, one variety is illuminated by a 5-watt phyto-lamp, and the other with an energy-saving 24-watt spiral. My light is on from 6 am to 10 pm.

April 15th.

Top dressing of seedlings

Seedlings of tobacco are developing normally

I thinned it out and left as much as I need, plus a small margin. Under the phyto-lamp, the flavors develop faster (they are on the right) than under the energy-saving one.

Although for the purity of the experiment, it is necessary to conduct an experiment on one variety of tobacco.

Today I fed the seedlings with an infusion of onion peels and a pick is just around the corner.

April 23rd.

The tobacco has grown noticeably and it already needs to be dived into separate cups. I will do this for May. now it doesn't work out a little. I’ll go to the village and there I’ll open my legs so that I don’t get bored with glasses later.

Kentucky Barley

Fragrant

I thinned all the plants again and left 12-15 roots each, with my tobacco consumption enough.

April 30.

The tobacco went down, albeit with a slight delay.

I put it in a greenhouse on the street, the weather allows + 22 degrees overboard.

On May 15-20, I will plant it in the garden.

May 28.

Is tobacco afraid of freezing

May 2017 turned out to be quite capricious in terms of planting tobacco, frosts were not uncommon. Many tobacco growers were afraid to plant their tobacco and did the right thing. Now, using my example, I will show you how frost affects tobacco seedlings.

The tobacco was planted in the ground on May 20, and on May 24 there was a frost of minus about 2-4 degrees on the ground. This is what the seedlings look like today:

It turns out this is such a sad picture. I have planted only 20 tobacco bushes, and there are people who plant 300-500 roots.

Here is already a huge disappointment if everything freezes. Therefore, do not rush to disembark, watch the weather.

Let it be better not a big shortage of tobacco in terms of incomplete maturation than biting your elbows later.

But there is in this ointment and a small spoonful of honey. Some bushes begin to come to life, letting out new leaves.

I will continue to observe the revival of tobacco after freezing temperatures and then deduce the percentage of how many survived.

June 11.

Restoration of tobacco after overnight freezing

Two weeks have passed since the night frosts and the loss of tobacco seedlings can be estimated. Of the 20 planted shrubs, 13 survived, 5 fragrant and 8 Kentucky barley. In the photo below, the largest bushes at the moment and the smallest.

Tobacco variety Fragrant

And the smallest Kentucky:

Of course they lose in time, especially barley, but nothing, we will observe further.

21st of June.

The tobacco begins to grow, plus they promise warm weather and then it will shoot. In the meantime, here's what it looks like: Variety Fragrant. And Kentucky Barley:

There is still a lot to make up for tobacco and he has time for that.

How cold weather affects tobacco growth

July 9.

The weather is not at all happy, it rains and it is cold. Last year I have already broken off more than half of the flavor tobacco. Now he is still quite small.

Fragrant

Tobacco variety Fragrant

Likewise, barley slows down, and given the fact that this is a late variety, I don't even know how it will mature.

Kentucky Barley

Let's hope that the warmth will still come to us, otherwise it’s quite sad.

August 1.

Three weeks have passed since the last report and this is how our tobacco looks now.

Aromatic tobacco variety

The lower leaves began to ripen, the peduncle appeared.

Ripe fragrant leaf

The Kentucky Barley fared worse. Half of the cold summer has done its job. The bushes are not tall and light yellow, you might think that the whole bush is ripe.

Kentucky Barley

 

Growing tobacco at home this year, let's say, is not quite working out. In 2-3 days I will begin to break the fragrant leaf.

8 August.

Breaking tobacco leaves

With such a bad summer, the leaf still began to ripen. Today I made my first break.

And hung it on languor, under a canopy.

Tobacco variety Fragrant, unambiguously a leader, and after freezing it got out and went through a bad summer. Plus, I did not see any illnesses on it.

Next time, in a village where tobacco grows, I will get to about three weeks later. Then I will break the tobacco leaf and wait for the seeds to ripen.

September 3rd.

Home tobacco growing is coming to an end

When dried, such green spots of chlorophyll appear on parts of the tobacco leaves.

On a completely yellow sheet, these spots begin to crawl out during the drying process. What is the reason, I do not know exactly. Excessive moisture possible. Last year, I did not observe such a phenomenon.

Tobacco seeds, weather permitting, should ripen in 2-3 weeks. He left the largest boxes on the bushes, removed the rest.

I also made the last break of a leaf of tobacco that I saw fit. The weather is damp and cold, and he still needs to dry. I hung a bathhouse in the attic.

And this is what my little tobacco plantation looks like at the moment.

Now we are waiting for the seeds of aromatic tobacco varieties to ripen.

October 1st.

Is tobacco afraid of autumn frosts

Yes, tobacco is afraid of autumn frosts. The temperature dropped by 1-2 degrees below zero and this is what came of it:

The leaves became like wet rags.

I threw out all such leaves, or rather put them on the humus. Here, in the garden, he crushed and plowed everything. To be honest, I have never tried to smoke such sheets. If you have the desire and curiosity, you can give it a try.

Not everything is going smoothly with tobacco seeds either. All the boxes have darkened, but not because they are ripe, but from frost. I will not take such seeds, since I am not sure of their quality. Fortunately, I have a stock of this variety.

P.S In general, the cultivation of tobacco at home this season did not go very smoothly. The weather conditions brought a lot of surprises.

I also noticed that if a tobacco leaf is dried in the attic, at the end of summer (the last breaks), and not under a canopy, then the leaf dries out in a pure yellow-brown color.

No green spots of chlorophyll, as in the photo from September 3. At the same time, I hung the sheet immediately as if it were drying.

Well, that seems to be all, we are waiting for the new season. Delicious tobacco to everyone!

Growing tobacco: planting, grooming, pest control. Which variety is suitable for growing tobacco at home?

Experienced summer residents assure that growing tobacco is no more difficult than growing tomatoes.

The plant is thermophilic and lends itself well to cultivation in the south country. But it is successfully cultivated even in cold regions.

Germination and final taste characteristics of tobacco will depend not only on the selected variety, but also on the condition of the soil on the site and the abundance of the sun.

Think tobacco is only grown by heavy smokers? No, this culture blooms beautifully, which will decorate any site, and can become a means to combat some diseases and pests common in the garden.

What kind of tobacco should you choose for growing?

There are many varieties of tobacco. But not all of them are suitable for home growing.

If you are a beginner in this business, choose those types of plants that are adapted to our climatic conditions - leave the "exotic" varieties for professionals, plant them in whole plantations for the further sale of tobacco leaves.

In world tobacco growing, the plant is divided into 2 types - cigar and cigarette. In our country, it is easier to cultivate cigarette varieties. We list the most popular varieties of tobacco that are chosen by experienced summer residents for cultivation in their summer cottages or at home:

•   Refectory 92. Viral-resistant variety. It is famous for its short growing season - you can harvest the crop 100 days after planting.

•    Dukat Crimean. It is a large plant with fragrant leaves up to 1 m in length. Ripens quickly.

•   Refectory Kubanets. Grows in 105-135 days. The variety is characterized by an average yield - about 25 technically suitable for processing tobacco leaves.

•   Virginia 202. It is a renal-ripening variety that perfectly gains strength and aroma. It is resistant to diseases and tolerates negative environmental conditions. The leaves contain a lot of carbohydrates.

•   Samsun 85. A mid-season variety that reaches maturity 105-110 days after planting on the site. Up to 50 leaves can be harvested from one bush - a high-yielding plant species.

•   Holly 316. The plant, in comparison with its other varieties, contains a small amount of nicotine. Ripens late - up to 120 days.

•    Dubeck... The variety is originally from Turkey. Named the best flavored tobacco in the world. In the middle lane, it will not show large yields - it is only suitable for growing in hot climates.

•    Country tobacco. Frost-resistant and unpretentious. Suitable for growing not only in an open area, but also on a windowsill or balcony.

•    Jubilee new 142. Fast ripening variety - can be harvested 80 days after planting. Resistant to many diseases.

Buy tobacco seeds from trusted vendors. It is unlikely that you will be able to find them on the free sale on store shelves - look for them in online stores or from private owners who are engaged in plant cultivation.

 

The cost of seeds, depending on the selected variety, ranges from 30-100 rubles. for 50 pcs.

And in the future, you will not need to buy seeds - 2-3 bushes of the plant will give so many seeds that it will be possible to sow a hectare of land with them.

Choosing a place for planting tobacco

Tobacco, if provided with optimal conditions for development, can take root in any conditions. The best soil for a plant is a light, loose, pebble-gravel structure, with a high humus content.

In swampy, too wet areas, tobacco will not grow. The culture loves the sun, and therefore, select unshaded areas of the garden for planting.

Cold winds should not blow here - they will be destructive for the seedlings.

Consider crop rotation when choosing a place to grow tobacco. It has been established that the best plant predecessors are legumes, cereals, winter breads, beets, perennial grasses.

But after nightshades and sunflowers, it is not recommended to plant tobacco in the same place, since these plants have similar diseases - there is a risk of infecting young plantings.

Sowing and planting tobacco

New to growing tobacco? Then start by cultivating several bushes, not entire beds - test your strength and check how well the selected plant variety takes root in the given climatic conditions.

Tobacco loves heat, so you can never wait for the harvest when sowing seeds directly into the open ground, since they will not hatch in cold ground. The best way - plant the plant with seedlings.

The seed material is very small, which makes it difficult to work with it. And although planting dry seeds is easier, it is better to pre-prepare them in order to achieve quick shoots.

To do this, 3-5 days before the intended planting on seedlings, soak the seeds, wrapped in a soft cloth, in warm clean water. Here you can add a couple of drops of tartaric acid or a few crystals of potassium nitrate.

 

Leave the seed in this form for a day.Then rinse the seeds, drain the excess water and leave in a warm place for germination in a faience or enamel container (also in a cloth). Moisten the cloth periodically.

After 2-4 days, the seeds hatch. A sprout longer than a seed must not be allowed! When most of the seeds hatch, they must be thoroughly dried, mixed with sand or humus.

In this state, if it is not possible to start planting the plant "right now", the material can be stored until planting for a few more days.

Start preparing seedlings for growing tobacco in February-March. By the beginning of the season, young seedlings are already strong enough to be transplanted to a "permanent residence". The scheme for sowing tobacco for seedlings is as follows:

• Fill the pot or seedling box with nutritious soil.

• Water the ground before sowing.

• Seeding depth - no more than 0.8 cm.

• Sprinkle the seeds with a mixture of humus and sand (3: 1).

• Water the soil (waterlogging is not allowed).

The optimum temperature for seeds to germinate is + 25… + 28 ˚C. You can keep a container with seedlings on the windowsill or balcony.

When the first shoots appear above the ground, it is better to lower the temperature to +20 ° C. Plantings should be watered regularly. Do this carefully so that the seeds do not go deep into the ground.

Feed the plant 2-3 times with mineral fertilizers (for example, saltpeter diluted in water).

Carry out a pick at the stage of 3-4 full-fledged leaves on the stalk. Seedlings will be ready for open field planting after 40-45 days.

 

A week before the deadline, start hardening young seedlings so that they gain strength and prepare for life in the open air.

Stop watering the plant in a couple of days.

Transfer the seedlings to an open area in May - when the threat of late spring frosts has completely passed. Do it like this:

• In the prepared grooves, make holes up to 30 cm deep. The distance between the plants is 20 cm, and between the rows - 70 cm.

• Pour 0.5-1 liters of water into each hole.

• Place the seedling together with a lump of "native" earth in the hole.

• Sprinkle the roots with damp earth, tamp a little.

• Pour dry earth on top.

Now, in order to get high yields of fragrant leaves at the end of the season, the tobacco needs to be properly cared for.

Growing and caring for tobacco

The best temperature for the growth and development of tobacco is 18-24 ° C. Some plant varieties can easily tolerate cold conditions - up to +2 ° C. Favorable soil moisture - 60-70%.

In low light, seedlings will develop poorly. Similar conditions can be provided in many regions of our country, which is why summer residents take up growing tobacco.

Your expectations for growing tobacco may not be met.

But the reason for poor germination and productivity does not always lie in the selected variety and seed quality.

Soil condition, day length, humidity and air temperature - everything matters when growing tobacco! How does a plant gain its final characteristics?

• The color, size and texture of the leaves depends on the composition of the soil.

• The scent of the leaves depends on the humidity of the air and soil.

• The leaves are saturated with a special taste due to free air circulation.

Let's list the basic rules for caring for plantings when growing tobacco:

• Watering. Stick to the "underfill is better than overfill" rule. Experienced summer residents get by with 2-3 waterings per season, while consuming 5-8 liters of water per 1 bush. When the plant has grown enough, you can stop watering it altogether.

•  Loosening. During the period of active growth, tobacco needs regular loosening and removal of weeds, otherwise the plantings will overgrow.

•   Top dressing. Correct fertilization yields excellent results. For good yields, it is important to maintain the optimal ratio of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium in the fertilizers used.

Immediately after planting the seedlings, you can fertilize them with superforfate slurry.A solution of sulfur in water is also effective. After the appearance of inflorescences, many summer residents process tobacco with an infusion of garlic and onion husks.

•    Shaping. Removing inflorescences and top leaves helps to increase the yield of tobacco, since nutrients will not be spent on flowering, but will go to the development of valuable leaves.

Tobacco pest and disease control

The smell of growing tobacco repels some pests. But there are still "specimens" that the plant attracts. Caring for the bushes, in the main, will be in the fight against diseases and pests.

Let's list the diseases and harm that are dangerous to tobacco:

•   Peach aphid. A common insect that feeds on both wild and cultivated tobacco.

Aphids suck the juice from the leaves and stems of the plant, thereby impairing the final properties of the raw material and reducing the yield. Aphids can be recognized by the sticky secretions that they leave after their "meals".

Having seen the first signs of a pest, you can treat the plantings with a solution of metathion or rogor.

•    Tobacco thrips. This pest eats not only tobacco, but also other cultivated plants. Insects eat the leaves, reducing yields and carrying dangerous diseases.

 

To avoid pest infestation, no later than a month before planting, treat the soil with 12% hexachlorane dust.

Spray with a diluted suspension of metathione or rogor three times per planting season.

•    Black root rot. A disease that often affects seedlings, but adult plants can also become infected.

The leaves of tobacco wither and dry up, and the roots die off in the advanced stages of the lesion. Watering the soil with benlate will help from rot.

The drug is used for prophylaxis during soil cultivation immediately after planting, and when the first signs of infection appear.

•   Blackleg. The disease can completely destroy the seedlings - the affected base of the stem becomes thin and gradually dies off.

The bad thing is that the causative agent of the disease remains in the soil - the next "batch" of plantings also becomes infected. The black leg is more pronounced in high humidity and in the ground with an excess of nitrogen.

For the prevention of black leg, you can try to spray the seedlings with a 0.3% suspension of 80% cineb.

•  Powdery mildew. A bacterial disease manifested by the appearance of a whitish powdery coating on the leaves. Tobacco leaves turn brown and lose their aroma upon further drying. Powdery mildew can be removed with a 1% colloidal sulfur suspension.

•   Mosaic. A pathogenic virus that changes the color of tobacco leaves - light green blotches appear.

Later, the infected areas of the leaves die off. The source of infection is plant debris not removed from the site before planting.

An effective remedy against all types of mosaics is 80% polycarbacin.

•   Bacterial hazel grouse. The disease is accompanied by the appearance of oily or weeping spots on the leaves, which leads to plant decay.

It is very difficult to get rid of the causative agent of the virus, since it can persist for some time even in the garden inventory. Summer residents are helped by mass spraying of plants with 0.5% Bordeaux liquid.

But it is better to prevent the disease by observing the crop rotation.

Since pathogens can remain in the soil and on the inventory, if an "infection" is found, it is recommended to process all working tools and, if possible, nearby soil areas. The inventory is well cleaned with 40% formalin. Then it should be kept for 3-4 days under a tarp at a temperature not lower than 10 ° C.

Harvesting tobacco

Already in August, you can start collecting tobacco. Some plant varieties need to be kept in the ground a little longer - until the end of September.

Gently break off the lower leaves of tobacco and keep in the sun for 2 days.

After that, the raw materials must be dried for a couple of months in a dark, humid room - a basement will do.

The process of preparing tobacco leaves for use is complex. To obtain aromatic cigar leaves at the output, their fermentation is necessary - the aging of the raw material under certain conditions.

 

Depending on the selected variety, the process differs in temperature and humidity indicators.

Home-made tobacco will necessarily differ in properties from products purchased in the store.

 

Good day, dear reader. Today, we will talk about the rules of growing tobacco at home. To find out how whimsical tobacco is and what conditions are necessary for its cultivation, a native of the Krasnodar NGO for tobacco products will help us.

So, as you know, in terms of climate, tobacco is more whimsical than the well-known shag. A favorite of smokers, the product loves the sun and the mild southern climate. Makhorka, on the contrary, can grow in any climatic zone. You can see the revised and updated manual at this link. There I described my experience as simply and in more detail as possible.

As a rule, Russian lands become fertile soil for the growth of Hollyleaf 215, Trapezond, Trapezonda 15, Yubileiny. And also for shag varieties: Pekhlets, AS 18/7, local Pekhlets, local Datura.

It is known that from seven and a half to eight kilograms of tobacco falls on one would-be smoker a year.

One hundredth of a hectare of land under favorable conditions can produce up to forty kilograms of dry weight of tobacco. (considering that the weight of a dried tobacco leaf can vary from eight tenths of a gram to one and a half grams, and up to thirty-three usable leaves can form on a tobacco plant per season).

The period from planting seedlings in the ground to the moment of harvesting is 135 days, makhorka - up to 80 days. Forcing seedlings takes up to 45 days. Typically, there are four tenths of a gram of seed per square meter of field, and about seven tenths of a meter of greenhouses or greenhouses per hundredth of a hectare. Just such an area gives up to nine hundred plants.

How to grow tobacco seedlings at home

You can grow tobacco and makhorka seedlings at home, this is usually done in flower pots or wooden boxes.

Before sowing, the seeds must be soaked in water. The soaking process takes only a day, while the temperature in the room should not drop below twenty-five degrees. The warmth in the room will catalyze the seed ripening process, which will shorten the seedling period and increase the tobacco / makhorka population.

As a rule, you need to take about three milliliters of solution per gram of seeds.

After a day, the seeds are washed, dried and laid out in several layers in a special container.

When germinating, the seeds should be covered with damp gauze or cloth from above and left either in a thermostat or in a constantly ventilated and consecrated room.

A little bit of the process of planting seedlings.

Sprouted seeds are evenly distributed over the surface of the soil, slightly pressing them into it. Then you should moisten the soil with a spray bottle.

One square meter of the greenhouse area contains thirteen hundredths of a cubic meter of nutrient mixture, which includes two hundredths of a cubic meter: humus - 50%, earth and sand - 25% each.

The average nutrient layer can be up to ten centimeters long. The optimal sowing periods are considered to be the third decade of February and the first decade of March.

Sowing raw materials are used in the following proportions:

• one bucket accounts for up to four grams of tobacco (makhorka - up to twenty grams).

Tobacco seeds are planted at a depth of up to five tenths of a centimeter, tobacco seeds - up to eight tenths. Before and after planting seeds, it is customary to irrigate, where one liter of water falls on one square meter of land.

After sowing has been carried out, it is very important to ensure that the moisture level in the soil does not drop... The seed growth process is divided into specific phases:

1. Phase "Cross"
   This phase requires a liter of water per square meter per day;
2. "Ears"
   There are three to five liters of water per square meter.

Also, each phase requires maintaining its own special temperature regime. For example, until the "cross" phase from sowing in the greenhouse, the temperature should be at 23-25 ​​degrees, in the next - 20 degrees Celsius.

Top dressing of tobacco seeds

In the process of growing tobacco at home, like other plants, tobacco and makhorka require mandatory feeding. So during growing, seedlings should be sprinkled up to four times and fertilized.

As a top dressing, a mineral fertilizer solution is usually used, which is prepared in the following proportions: ten liters of water, thirty grams of ammonia nitrate, up to sixty grams of superphosphate and either twenty grams of potassium sulfate, or twenty grams of forty percent potassium salt.

Instruments:

• For feeding, experienced gardeners use a watering can with a special nozzle, the holes of which are a quarter of a centimeter in diameter. There are approximately ten liters of water per four square meters of the nursery.

Fertilizers:

• Infused chicken droppings are good organic fertilizers. To prepare it, put a kilogram of droppings in a ten-liter container of water and leave to infuse for ten days. Remember to stir occasionally. At the end of the period, the mixture will ferment and the resulting "result" can be filtered. Add water to the strained litter solution: one part of the solution is five parts of water.

A week before planting, the seedlings need to be hardened by reducing the number of water supplies, a couple of days before planting the seedlings, the water supply should be stopped altogether. Such a procedure will help you increase the resistance of plants to unfavorable external factors, will give immunity to growing in the open air.

Well seasoned seedlings do not break even when the stem is screwed onto the finger.

Water the seedlings generously a few hours before hauling. It is usually chosen individually, thereby reducing the risk of sampling diseased or not yet fully developed plants.

Basically, plants are suitable for planting, reaching a height of fourteen to sixteen centimeters, with a stem thickness of up to three to five hundredths of a centimeter and with at least five leaves.

Planting tobacco in the ground

Planting in the ground is carried out at the most favorable temperature and the plants are planted at least ten centimeters in depth.

Tobacco planting starts on April 20th and ends on May 25th.... during strong thaws, when the risk of frost has passed completely.

The ideal planting density of tobacco is 70 by 30 centimeters, makhorka - 70 to 20. When planting seedlings along the drawn furrow, the holes are usually placed at a distance of at least thirty centimeters from each other for tobacco, and twenty for makhorka. After landing, half a liter of water is poured into the holes.

Remember: seedlings must be laid out along the furrow, turning the leaves to the left of the planter.

The planter positions the body so that he can deepen the hole with his left hand, and plant the plant with his right hand and cover its roots with earth, if you plant more than a hundred square meters, it will be much faster, I have already gotten used to it with a friend.

To help the plants adapt to the new environment and increase their growth, the roots of the seedlings can be dipped in mullein solution. It is prepared from cow dung and an appropriate amount of clay. The excess solution is shaken off from the roots, and the roots themselves are sprinkled with humus mixed with superphosphate. (1: 4)

In order for the plant to grow successfully, do not forget to regularly loosen the ground, remove weeds, water the plant and treat against parasites and diseases.

As soon as the tobacco (or makhorka) blooms, break off the top inflorescences and side shoots.

Watering the plant is done depending on the humidity. Typically, one plant has six to eight liters of water.

Diseases and Difficulties in the Growth Process of Tobacco

There are several main diseases that should be actively combated:

Peronosporosis. A solution of 0.3 percent polycarbacin or 0.4% zineb suspension is usually used against it. Five liters of such funds are sprayed on one hundredth of a hectare of land;

Aphid. When fighting aphids, experienced gardeners usually use actelik or rogor. The first of them is added 20-10 grams per ten-liter container, for the second 10-20 grams for the same amount of water. When aphids appear, the plants are sprayed with actelik (20-30 g per 10 l of water) or rogor (10-20 g per 10 l of water).

Harvesting and drying of the tobacco crop

The collection of tobacco leaves begins from the lower tiers of the plant, focusing on the degree of their leaves, yellowing, distributing the collection into five or six steps.

Tobacco leaves should not be removed in an unripe or overripe state, nor should they be picked when wet. The collected leaves are spread in layers thirty centimeters thick and folded in the shade. After about twelve hours, the withered leaves are attached to cords and suspended from a drying facility. Naturally, do not forget that the leaves will not dry out either in the rain or in a strong wind.

Sun drying should not last more than seventeen hours. By the way, it is after it that we get the final raw material for the product.

In cloudy weather, the raw material dries up slowly, acquiring a darkish color.

The dried tobacco must be removed carefully so that it does not crumble. Lows with tobacco leaves are folded in four and fastened to a cord in bundles of six laces. (such a set is low with tobacco will be called a havanka). Havanka, as usual. They are hung on poles in a special storage room and left until autumn. Then, in the fall, the tobacco leaves are removed, smoothed and packaged.

Fermented tobacco is suitable for making cigarettes. In addition, this very fermentation can be done at home.

Approximate fermentation algorithm:

1. Fold the tobacco into a container and heat it for several days at temperatures up to fifty degrees Celsius, while the air humidity should be kept within sixty to sixty percent;
2. After the expiration of the period, the humidity of the air must be increased to seventy-five percent (the temperature remains unchanged) and the raw materials must be left to infuse for five days;
3. Gradually lower the air temperature over forty-eight hours and at the same time increase the air humidity to eight ten percent;
4. Cooling tobacco to twenty-twenty-five degrees and reducing humidity to eleven percent. The tobacco cooling process lasts up to three days, after which the raw material is allowed to rest for a little less than a month.

Tobacco cutting is carried out with fibers, the width of which reaches five to seven tenths of a millimeter. Cigarettes are usually eighty-five millimeters long and eight millimeters in diameter. One cigarette accounts for eight tenths of a gram to one gram.

High quality cigarettes are usually made by mixing different tobacco varieties.

The sale of tobacco is not a priori problem, since due to the widespread use of cigarettes, the tobacco business is a profitable business.

How much tobacco is enough for a smoker for a year

I plant seedlings with a margin of 200-220 bushes, usually about 10% does not emerge and dies (a lot depends on what, but mainly on seeds and climatic whims), I usually plant Burleigh and Virginia 30% by 70%. I agree with the author of the video, hundreds are quite enough.

I will definitely write about the seeds, a couple of subtleties.

For a season, about 150-200 bushes of tobacco (less than 1 hundred square meters) are enough even for an inveterate smoker.

Who grows the most

Cultivation of tobacco is carried out in the most unexpected corners of the world due to its high adaptability to various conditions of existence.
The appearance of tobacco depends on the environmental conditions in which it lives.Nicotiana tobacum began its commercial production in Virginia in the early 17th century.

Subsequently, it turns out that it is the climatic conditions of the southeastern United States that are ideal for growing tobacco.

Today, it is the United States that is one of the largest producers and exporters of tobacco around the world.

The first place among manufacturers of tobacco products is China, which itself consumes a significant part of its own crop. Tobacco is also actively grown in India and Brazil.

 

Growing tobacco or makhorka is not difficult at all. We are often asked about this process, and, combining personal experience with the advice of experienced ones, including our readers, we decided to publish this material. I must say that the process of growing tobacco is not much different from growing, for example, tomatoes. But still, growing tobacco, you need to know certain features of this plant. This is what our publication is about.

Content:

• General information about the tobacco plant
• Should you grow tobacco?
• Features of growing tobacco
• Tobacco pests and diseases
• Tobacco drying and fermentation

General information about the tobacco plant

Tobacco (Nicotiana) is a genus of perennial and annual plants of the Solanaceae family. Grown to obtain raw materials used in tobacco products. In culture, the following types are most often found:

• Ordinary tobacco, or Virginia Tobacco, or Real Tobacco (Nicotiana tabacum). The plant is up to 3 m high with pink flowers, a tubular corolla with sharp lobes, leaves are oblong-lanceolate, sessile. Real tobacco is quite thermophilic, therefore it is especially productively grown in hot regions. In our country, ordinary tobacco is grown south of 55 ° north latitude (this is approximately the latitude of Ryazan, Smolensk, Ulyanovsk, Ufa, Chelyabinsk, Kurgan, Omsk, Novosibirsk and Kemerovo). Ordinary tobacco is cultivated in many countries of the world and has many varieties.
• Common shag, or Rustic tobacco (Nicotiana rustica) - a plant much lower than ordinary tobacco (up to 120 cm high), yellowish flowers, corolla with a short tube and rounded blades, ovoid leaves, narrow, obtuse at the end. The leaves of this more unpretentious plant contain half as much nicotine.

In the 19th century in Russia, makhorka was cultivated on an industrial scale everywhere (even in the Urals and Siberia). Even now, some villagers traditionally grow this plant from their own seeds.

Bolivia and Peru are considered the homeland of tobacco; it was brought to Europe by the expeditions of Christopher Columbus. Traditional areas of cultural cultivation - North America, China, India, Asia Minor. On the territory of the former USSR, ordinary tobacco is cultivated in the Transcaucasia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Moldova, Ukraine, Crimea and Krasnodar Territory. Tobacco is a thermophilic plant, the optimal summer temperature for it is about 30 ° C. Moist, light, free-flowing sandy soils are suitable for it. Tobacco is propagated by seeds, growing seedlings from them, which are then planted in the ground.

All parts of the plant contain nicotine (nicotine leaves most of all - 0.75-2.88%). Nicotine is a potent neurotoxin and cardiotoxin that causes short-term euphoria. The use of tobacco in various forms and in various ways (smoking, chewing, sniffing) causes physical and psychological dependence. Nicotine is extremely toxic. Some of the substances in tobacco are carcinogenic. That's why smoking tobacco is dangerous to health.

Should you grow tobacco?

Suppose you are a smoker, and you have the good fortune to live somewhere in the south of Russia or in Ukraine. You have at your disposal several acres of land. Why not try on the role of Philip Morris or at least Jack Vosmerkin, an American?

First, some fun arithmetic. One cigarette contains about a gram of tobacco. And the cheaper the cigarettes, the less it is there. That is, the pack contains about 20 grams.If a person smokes a pack a day, he will need about 6-8 kilograms of tobacco per year.

Under favorable conditions, about 30 g of smoking tobacco can be obtained from one plant, and six to seven plants can be placed on 1 square meter. The planting density of large-leaved varieties is 70 × 30 cm, and the planting density of medium-sized tobacco and makhorka is 70 × 20 cm.It turns out that you need to grow 270-300 plants, occupying about 40 square meters. m. plot. Moreover, if the tobacco turned out to be too "evil", it can be diluted with the stems.

Therefore, from the point of view of economy and finances, it is definitely profitable for a smoker to grow tobacco.

Features of growing tobacco

Further in the article we will talk about the cultivation of ordinary tobacco. If you decide to grow shag (Nicotiana rustica), then you will not need many of the tips given, shag is much easier to grow and less thermophilic. For the middle lane, it is sown in May in the ground under a film or covering material, and it has time to grow and give a crop.

So, the first thing to attend to is the seeds and their planting. Seeds are now sold on the Internet on many sites, you just need to choose a store convenient for you and a variety of tobacco.

Tobacco varieties

There are many varieties of ordinary tobacco. It is worth saying that for the period from 1990 to 2010. in the All-Russian Research Institute of Tobacco, more than 20 new productive and disease-resistant varieties of tobacco with excellent characteristics have been bred.

As with vegetables, it is better to choose local varieties for your site. Therefore, we list some popular varieties that are zoned for the territories of the former USSR:

• Refectory Kubanets. The growing season from planting seedlings to the last breaking is 103-134 days. Technically suitable leaves on average 27 pcs. The nicotine content is 2.6%.
• Refectory 92. The variety is resistant to numerous damaging factors, viral tobacco diseases. It has a short growing season. On average, leaf breaking occurs 98 days after planting.
• Samsun 85. The variety belongs to intensively ripening varieties, mid-season - the number of days from planting to leaf breaking will be approximately 105-110 days. The number of technically ripe leaves from one tobacco bush is about 50 pcs.
• Jubilee new 142. The growing season from planting seedlings to ripening of leaves of average breaking is 78 days, to the last breaking 82 days. The nicotine content in the leaves is 2.0-2.1%. The variety has a complex resistance to tobacco diseases.
• Holly 316. Late-ripening form, intensive type of leaf maturation. Low in nicotine. From planting to maturation of the leaves of the last breaking 120 days.

Planting seeds

We recommend growing just a few bushes for the first year. So you will test your strength and find out all the nuances of the process. Therefore, you need very few seeds to get started. Tobacco seeds are as small as dust. There are about 12 thousand tobacco seeds in one gram, and about 4 thousand pieces of makhorka. To get the annual “rate” of a smoker, you need to sow only a quarter of a gram of tobacco seeds or three-quarters of a gram of tobacco seeds. You don't have to buy seeds anymore. Two or three bushes will give them more than needed for sowing a hectare.

Tobacco seeds remain viable for a long time, so sowing with old seeds is also possible, although it must be borne in mind that their germination decreases over time.

Tobacco can be planted on the seedlings on the windowsills, with or without a pick. The required age of seedlings is 40-45 days. But this technique is good only for small (up to a quarter of a hundred) volumes. However, for the first experiment we don't need more. When growing tobacco in large volumes, it is either immediately planted in the ground (in warm climates), or greenhouses and nurseries are used.

Tobacco seeds are sown superficially, scattering them over wet soil.

An important point. The seeding depth of tobacco seeds is no more than 0.7-0.8 cm (0.3-0.5 cm for shag).After sowing, they are only slightly pressed into the ground and watered very carefully so that the seeds do not go deep.

You can sow not dry seeds, but hatched seeds. In this case, 4 days before sowing, the seeds are soaked in warm clean water and placed on a damp cloth. This will speed up the germination of the seeds and shorten the time to forcing the seedlings by a week.

The optimum temperature for germination of tobacco seeds is + 25ºC… + 28ºC. If the temperature is lower, then this can delay the emergence of plants, or even destroy them altogether.

It is impossible to overmoisten, as well as overdry the seedlings. It is best to water a little, almost daily.

Transplanting

Seedlings are planted when it reaches a height of 15 cm, has 5-6 developed true leaves and a well-developed root system. At this moment, the danger of spring frosts should be avoided outside the window, and the soil at a depth of 10 cm should warm up above 10 ° C. This period is different in different regions, but approximately it is from the end of April to the end of May.

A week before planting, it is necessary to start hardening the seedlings, reducing watering and accustoming them to open air. 2-3 days before planting, watering the seedlings is completely stopped, watering abundantly only 2-3 hours before planting.

Plants are planted one at a time in the holes, after pouring 1 liter of water into them. In general, the process is very similar to planting tomato seedlings. And of course, every transplant is a shock for the plant. Therefore, it is advisable to preserve on the roots the soil in which the seedlings grew.

Care

During the growing period, it is necessary to regularly loosen the ground, remove weeds, feed and water. You can feed the plants based on the fertilization rates of tomatoes. Watering is usually limited to two to three waterings per summer, consuming 6-8 liters of water per plant. It is better to water the tobacco insufficiently than to water it.

A rooted tobacco bush can have roots up to several meters, and many tobacco growers find watering mature bushes harmful. However, it would be nice to water the tobacco a few days before harvesting.

In flowering plants, inflorescences are broken off (vershoking) and lateral shoots are regularly removed (pinching).

The soil

Tobacco is planted on fresh soil, in the absence of such, it is placed either after steam, or after winter crops or other plants that impose other nutrient requirements on the soil. For this reason, tobacco should not be planted, for example, after beets and potatoes.

The best soils for tobacco should be considered sandy loam, characterized by the presence of potassium and nitrogen, which are necessary for the tobacco plant.

Like all immigrants from the New World, tobacco is rapidly depleting the soil. But the remedy is known - fertilizers perfectly solve this problem.

The best fertilizer for tobacco is cow dung. Bird droppings and oilcakes are also considered useful fertilizers for tobacco. On soils poor in lime, liming is used, it has a beneficial effect not only on the culture, but also on the completeness of combustion of the tobacco plant.

Harvesting begins when the color of the tobacco leaves changes from green to yellow-green or light green. Since even one bush will have leaves of varying degrees of color, the harvesting can take several weeks.

Tobacco pests and diseases

Tobacco is damaged by a number of pests, namely:

• Peach aphid, Greenhouse aphids, Tobacco aphids. A dangerous pest of tobacco. A widespread species, it feeds on many cultivated and wild plants. Peach aphid inhabits all organs of the tobacco plant and sucks the juice out of them, which leads to a decrease in the yield and quality of raw materials.
• Blackleg... It is manifested by lodging and mass death of seedlings. The base of the stems becomes thinner and decays. A brown or white bloom appears on the affected surface. The pathogen remains in the soil.
• Powdery mildew. It is observed soon after planting seedlings in the ground. Separate spots with a cobweb-powdery bloom appear on the lower leaves; then the plaque becomes solid and covers the upper leaves.The mushroom hibernates on plant debris. The disease reduces photosynthesis, leads to plant oppression. Reduces the yield and quality of raw materials.
• Black root rot more often it affects seedlings, but adult plants also get sick. On the affected seedlings, the leaves wilt, turn yellow and dry out, the roots turn brown or black and often die off. In adult plants, the leaves become attached, and black and white spots form at the ends of the roots.
• Common broomstick... Distributed throughout the south and southeast of Kazakhstan. The parasite settles on the roots of tobacco and develops at the expense of the host plant, forming a powerful branching stem of purple color. As a result of mass destruction of plants by broomrape, the yield of tobacco and the quality of raw materials are reduced. Broomrape propagates by seeds that remain in the soil for many years.
• Mosaic... The leaves of diseased plants have normal green patches that alternate with light green. Later, the tissue dies off in spots. The main source of plant infection is post-harvest residues of diseased plants, both in greenhouses and in the field.
• Bacterial hazel grouse. Oily or weeping spots appear on the tips of the leaves of young seedlings or along the edges of the leaves. In wet weather, they rot, and the whole plant becomes infected from them. Round chlorotic spots appear on the leaves of grown plants, which merge, forming patches of dead tissue. The causative agent of the disease is stored in tobacco leaves, in tobacco dust, in inventory.

Tobacco drying and fermentation

Well, the most important part of getting smoking tobacco is drying and fermentation. Let's make a reservation right away: if you do not smoke, have no previous experience with tobacco, it will be quite difficult for you to determine the degree of readiness. You can either not dry it out, or rot. However, let me remind you that our grandfathers grew and dried makhorka without a higher education.

Drying

After collecting, the tobacco leaves are hung to dry in a ventilated room, while it is advisable to place containers with water there to increase humidity. The leaves dry out in about a month.

Then the dried leaves must be moistened with clean water from a spray bottle and folded into piles, covered with polyethylene, and kept for up to a day for uniform moistening. The leaves should feel soft, but not soggy. After that, the leaves, either whole or cut, are hidden in sealed glass containers (jars) for fermentation.

Fermentation

Fermentation is a biochemical process that takes place at a constant temperature of 50 ° C for several weeks. Tobacco is fermented to reduce the strength, change the taste for the better, and reduce nicotine and tar. This can be done, for example, in electric ovens at a temperature of + 50ºC… + 60 ºC. Sometimes it is more convenient to dry cut leaves rather than whole leaves.

The resulting tobacco can be smoked in pipes, wrapped in cigarettes, fortunately, wrapping machines and tissue paper are now sold in many places. Finally, you can try making a cigar - it's easy and fun.

Of course, our material does not claim to be a detailed textbook, and many subtleties remained unaffected. And if you are serious about growing tobacco, you will need to study this issue more. But in order to get the first harvest, you already know enough.

We'd love to read your tips and secrets for growing, drying and fermenting tobacco.

And in conclusion, we remind you once again: smoking is addictive and harmful to your health. If you don't smoke, don't start. If you smoke, maybe it's time to quit? Nerd against smoking!