Kaneo's Grow Log - NZ

[Kaneo]

To introduce myself I'm from sunny Hawkes bay in New Zealand, i see a few other Kiwis on here growing tobacco and it is interesting to read your grow logs. i am a little further north than Invercargil but probably have a similar climate to the waiarapa.

I'm new to growing tobacco - first year for me and I'm sure I will need plenty of advice on the way, I have struggled to find many varietys available in NZ so I have only started Virginia gold. My main interest is in cigars and I have tried to order some different varaitys from "Coffin Nails" website that seems to be UK based but I have not recieved these yet

I have an area of 12 metres x 4 metres without encroaching on the wifes backyard to much so will try to use this to my best ability.

I have added a grow log that I started for myself if people are interested, any helpful comments appreciated. i hope the pictures Ive added work and are not to big for what is normally accepted on the website

03/09/2012
Spring has finally arrived in the Southern hemisphere so it’s time to get down to the business end of growing tobacco.

I purchased my Virginia gold seed on Trade me prior to this, seems to be the only variety available to me in New Zealand?

I started my tobacco growing by cleaning out two 100 litre AR620 Aquariums. I had these from when I was doing tropical fish.
I purchased 2 x seed trays, 1 x 10ltr Yates seed mix and a misting spray bottle from Mitre 10
The Yates seed mix was placed into the trays. I poured in two inches of water into each aquarium and rested the seed trays into the water. I misted the surface of each tray and sprinkled the tobacco seed, the trays were misted again and the fluorescent tubes turned on.

Note these are aquarium lights not pro growing lights or anything. I plan to have these on during the night to maintain warmth in the potting mix.
I plan to mist on a daily basis and will report back when the seedlings start to show through the soil.




09/09/2012
I originally had the left aquarium behind the right one to keep them both on the lino floor. The only problem with this was the aquarium closest to the window was blocking the sun for the second tank.
This has caused the seedlings in the left aquarium to start slower than the right. I have also started placing a blanket on top of the aquariums to hold in more heat, I have to be careful though as I don’t want to start a fire.
I think I could have got these seedlings going quicker by adding additional water to the tank and submersing an aquarium heater. The seed trays could have been placed on blocks due to the depth of the water.
The seedlings would have been closer to the lights and had a good constant warm temp through the night
I have taken a photo today of the right aquarium to show the germination.

The strike rate seems pretty good as this is just a small portion of one tray. I plan to thin out the weaker seedlings and aim to grow on 100 plants.


10/09/2012

I have decided to leave the lights off from now on, I am concerned that the distance the lights are away will cause the plants to become to leggy. I will leave the aquariums in full sunlight.

I have added another photo to show the change in size of the seedlings.

12/09/2012
I spent a couple of hours filling up hundred and fifty 250ml polystyrene cups with potting mix. This took about 40 litres of yate’s potting mix.
I have ended up putting the lights back on in the aquariums – had a real cold snap here with snow on the ranges.
I also picked up another couple of aquariums to place the cups into.

15/09/2012
Today I have thinned the seedlings down to about 200. I had also thinned them down on the 13[SUP]th[/SUP] and probably started with 600+ seedlings

02/10/2012

It has been awhile since I have noted down the tobaccos progress so I will add some more photos. I have the tobacco in several different aquariums, Warehouse propapgators and plastic storage containers.

 

[SmokesAhoy]

very cool, looks like you are getting your feet wet quit. 1 variety is easier i think, than trying to keep track of different things. look forward to seeing the rest of your season. those plants look very healthy and happy already.

 

[COLIN]

Hi Kaneo good to see another New Zealander on this forum.I see u are mainly growing for cigar's and u may need a couple more verities binder wrapper if so pm me and i wii see what i can do to get them up to u regard's colin.

 

[Seanz]

Hi Kaneo, man the Old Hawkes bay is rocking, good stuff, I first grew up there two years ago now and my Virginia just went Boom! its a good climate for it.
I might have some seed you could be keen on as well bro PM me !
One thing you might want to raise them out of the water. getting the soil too wet is not a good thing.
IF i was you i would drain those tanks and just water when the soil needs it i noticed the they look a tad soaked!

 

[johnlee1933]

Hi Kaeno, Welcome to the fold. I know it is a bit late but I sent Seanz a variety of seeds. He might share a few with you. Among them was some CT shade that I really like a wrapper (and sometimes binder). Ring him up and see if there is anything you might like.

john

 

[Steve2md]

Welcome Kaneo! Good looking write up. Very well organized notes. I'm looking forward to stalking your thread!

 

[Kaneo]

Thank you for your helpfull and encouraging replys, its good to see an active forum of like minded people

Thank you also for the generous offers of seed. I would appreciate this as my end goal is to roll my own cigars

I plan to reduce the water down in the tanks today then have a cold beer while catching up on the forums.

Steady as she goes

 

[SmokesAhoy]

If you have rain even once in 2 weeks watering is probably unnecessary

 

[Kaneo]

well I go fairly excited today, was like Christmas, I was saying stuff ooh yer and wooh and stuff

Mrs got home said that I had mail from overseas and it finally was my seed from the UK - Con Shade, Con Broad and Havana.

Woot, wish it was a month ago but still reckon I have time to grow it out.

So I got busy and planted it the same as the original virginia.

yep still fairly amped, just need to figure out a plan for the layout

 

[Jack in NB]

Welcome to the best tobacco site on the planet!

Did a bit of math on your available area, and you might not have a lot of room for all those healthy looking babies!

My patch is about 25 m long by 3 m wide. A double row a bit over 1 m wide with 30 plants in each row, a .8 m walkway down the center, and another double row, for a total of 120 plants in the 75 sq m plot.

Plant rows are about .8 m apart, and plants about .8 m apart, with the second row staggered from the first to give the plants a bit more spacing between each.

They are a bit crowded at maturity - could use a bit more elbow room.

My yield here is probably 90 g average processed tobacco per plant, or about 10 kg per crop. And I'm gaining - still smoking my 2010 crop. The later leaf is aging nicely in storage, so I'll dispense with the kiln processing in the future.

For my first few crops the kiln was a lifesaver though - it turned the leaf from a very bitter smoke (which also tended to drive bystanders away!) to a pleasant experience.

I'll cut back to probably 75 plants next season.

Good luck with the crop!

 

[Chicken]

very nice setup you have using them aquariums,

the seeds, and young plants thrive, on all that humidity you got built up on the sides, of the glass,

and looks like you got some good varities for cigars,

is that your plan to make cigars,?

 

[Kaneo]

Hey Chicken,

yer I'm keen on growing for cigars so was fairly happy to see the Hav and con shad/broad turn up, though I still want to roll some ciggys so I'm thinking now some burley would have been the go to mix with the virginia.

The aquariums have been real handy, nice bit of humidity and the seeds seem to thrive on it for sure.

I've been looking at what I should have as a layout and with new varietys and a slightly better understanding of room for plants ( I think I have been to optimistic ) I've changed track a bit - also thinking I'm gonna need to secure a bit more of the backyard than I first thought.

I've had a bit of a plan going on in excel.

I have yellow as Virginia Gold,blue as Havanna, green as Con Broad and grey as Con Shade.

My area now is bigger than first thought, including a smaller garden on the end of the existing for Con Broad and a tree shaded garden for the Con Shade at the rear of the yard - also thinking I should roll some satelite plants in 5 gallon buckets as I can get them for free from work.

I have alot to do as far as digging over my patch and clearing stuff, Baccy aint a lazy mans game for sure.

Have to square off the lawn, clear the old raised gardens and dig it over.

 

[Kaneo]

Sorry about the double post but my laptop died.

I have the area belwo for the Con Shade, needs a bit of a cut back but i think it will be the business - hopefully no mold or insects from the trees - hawkes bay has a good sunny climate to avoid mold I think

Also I have included a couple of springs pics for those heading into winter including my garage that i think i will use for colour curing or maybe Ill use upstairs as the garage gets reasonably hot.

 

[COLIN]

I think the more space u give your plant's give's them the best chance to show there true phenomone.

Colin

 

[Seanz]

Just think if you get rid of all that unproductive grass you could sell the mower, lol

 

[Kaneo]

Yer trying not to be to blatant about taking to much of the back yard, could cause a bit of a backlash.

 

[Seanz]

Luckily i am not in that position any more, come dec I am a single living alone guy, once again

 

[deluxestogie]

Kaneo,
If each plant is alloted ~3.75 sq. ft. per plant, they will grow just fine. Your staggered rows maximize the plants you can fit.

My experience, however, is that I can adequately access (read "maintain, worm and sucker") three staggered rows deep of smaller plants, and only two staggered rows deep of full size plants. It seems like wasting space to leave ~3' minimum-width path between pairs or triplets of staggered rows, but you may find that you end up damaging a lot of leaf reaching those deeply embedded rows for maintenance.

Johnlee1936 has grown multiple staggered rows with apparent success. Perhaps he could offer helpful comments on your layout.

Bob

 

[johnlee1933]

Kaneo,
If each plant is alloted ~3.75 sq. ft. per plant, they will grow just fine. Your staggered rows maximize the plants you can fit.

My experience, however, is that I can adequately access (read "maintain, worm and sucker") three staggered rows deep of smaller plants, and only two staggered rows deep of full size plants. It seems like wasting space to leave ~3' minimum-width path between pairs or triplets of staggered rows, but you may find that you end up damaging a lot of leaf reaching those deeply embedded rows for maintenance.

Johnlee1936 has grown multiple staggered rows with apparent success. Perhaps he could offer helpful comments on your layout.

Bob

I agree with Bob. If you look at the early pages of my 2012 grow log there is a pic of my layout. Most of the plants grew well but there was some problem with maintenance. I have to put up with is as I have no more space. I did have some breakage loss. If I had more space I'd plant with more spacing not more plants. It is what it is and my crop was satisfactory.

John

 

[Kaneo]

Thanks for the advice, current layout has around 3sq ft per plant. One part of me says keep the layout (current amount of plants) and the other says reduce a row of VG and put a path up the middle. Havn't quite convinced myself of that yet - trying to rack my brain for other layout options or where I could put the ousted VG if I do go with the path.

On a bright note the first Havana seedling came through today - planted on the 06/10