Brown Thumbs, 2015 Ramblings and Babbling Grow Thingie

[deluxestogie]

...it's not so much the aphids, but their Chit on the leaves below them (they can turn nearly black)...

Honeydew is a mixture of simple and complex sugars (oligosaccharide and polysaccharide starches), amino acids--as well as entire proteins and, in tobacco-feeding aphids, likely nicotine alkaloids. Ants like this stuff, and can often be seen collecting the honeydew from tobacco leaves.

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0074656
http://www.researchgate.net/profile...references/links/02e7e51bad0bf3436e000000.pdf
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4242560/

My impression is that the sugars and starches, which together are the largest component of aphid honeydew, behave much like the polysaccharide gums often used as "cigar glue." When honeydew residual on kilned leaf occurs on relatively dry filler, it doesn't seem to make much of a difference in taste or aroma. On binder leaf, the presence of honeydew, often greatest at the stalk end of the leaf--which ends up at the head of a cigar, serves to replace cigar glue for the binder. The greatest drawback to honeydew on wrapper leaf (aside from being marginally disgusting) is that it adds a sweet taste to the head of the cigar.

Bob

 

[Brown Thumb]

Honeydew is a mixture of simple and complex sugars (oligosaccharide and polysaccharide starches), amino acids--as well as entire proteins and, in tobacco-feeding aphids, likely nicotine alkaloids. Ants like this stuff, and can often be seen collecting the honeydew from tobacco leaves.

http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0074656
http://www.researchgate.net/profile...references/links/02e7e51bad0bf3436e000000.pdf
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4242560/

My impression is that the sugars and starches, which together are the largest component of aphid honeydew, behave much like the polysaccharide gums often used as "cigar glue." When honeydew residual on kilned leaf occurs on relatively dry filler, it doesn't seem to make much of a difference in taste or aroma. On binder leaf, the presence of honeydew, often greatest at the stalk end of the leaf--which ends up at the head of a cigar, serves to replace cigar glue for the binder. The greatest drawback to honeydew on wrapper leaf (aside from being marginally disgusting) is that it adds a sweet taste to the head of the cigar.

Bob

Dang, I always though Honeydew was that list of chit for me to do my wife hangs on the refrigerator.

 

[Brown Thumb]

Time for the Pa Red to get harvested if its pa red or catterton.
dang suckers are huge. Cleaning house 3/4 of the way there.
they got small. I might string these leaves?

 

[kullas]

Plants look good to me. My Va gold is ready to pick also

 

[Brown Thumb]

Got them all suckered and down. I Put the leanto up. There short so I might hang one then hang another from it.
I got Baccy everywhere. Oh Yea. Rock On.

 

[DGBAMA]

Wow. Busy guy.

 

[Brown Thumb]

Wow. Busy guy.

Taste testing my first Ripe devels Yellow Tongue pepper.
Good Heat. Yea.

 

[Brown Thumb]

This pod is up there on heat and taste
Wow, Lemon. Heat comes on slow. Good Burn. Don't last long tho.
I Like it.

 

[kullas]

Pepper looks good. All that backer looks good to.

 

[Knucklehead]

That's a lot of baccy for a one man operation. You're doing a hell of a job.

 

[Brown Thumb]

Pretty much done harvesting for the season, I might do a mixed leaf flue cure if this batch turns out good.

 

[Brown Thumb]

This guy is a little late to the party. Found it yesterday.
I have no idea how it is alive. Looks like it has been stepped on at least once by the crooked stalk.
It is in my garden, last time I planted Baccy there was 3 yrs ago. Let alone find a hole in the black plastic to Gro thru.
Looks like Izmir to me

 

[deluxestogie]

The leaves are petiolate (a stem separates the lamina from the stalk), so I would say Samsun, Bafra, or Bursa--something in that family. (That's assuming it's not a rustica.)

Bob

 

[Chicken]

Your area looks like mine..lol

Any leaf that was undesirable to make it on the wire...got laid on the floor to cure...all of it unlabled..my floor bacca will all be blended toghter..and see what it smokes like.

 

[Brown Thumb]

The leaves are petiolate (a stem separates the lamina from the stalk), so I would say Samsun, Bafra, or Bursa--something in that family. (That's assuming it's not a rustica.)

Bob

It could be Rustica. That was grown in the top row 3 Yrs ago.
Good Call, Thank You.
I got to keep her going to the end of the season.

 

[Brown Thumb]

Your area looks like mine..lol

Any leaf that was undesirable to make it on the wire...got laid on the floor to cure...all of it unlabled..my floor bacca will all be blended toghter..and see what it smokes like.

When mine hits the floor it is called Compost.
Funny thing is the compost pile has a lot of good looking leaf in it a week later after sun curing.

 

[deluxestogie]

It could be Rustica.

Yellow blossoms-->it's rustica.

Bob

 

[ProfessorPangloss]

Your area looks like mine..lol

Any leaf that was undesirable to make it on the wire...got laid on the floor to cure...all of it unlabled..my floor bacca will all be blended toghter..and see what it smokes like.

Greg Pease (the pipe master) wrote a piece about working in different tobacco shops over the years, and at one, he threw all his scraps into an enormous jar that he jokingly labeled "Byzantine Mixture." His eventual replacement, years later, told him that he was smoking this crazy thing he found in the back of the shop, and wouldn't you guess it was the jar of scraps, having aged several years.

Here's the story. If you haven't read his column, it's worth it. Haven't seen an update in a long while. Wonder what the guy's up to.

 

[Smokin Harley]

Thanks Prof, interesting story...and I made sure to save the site for future reading .

 

[Brown Thumb]

Beans and Baccy. I never noticed it and my wife said its been there while.
Amazing she didn't pull it out thinking it was a weed.
I wonder what it is.