Deluxestogie Grow Log 2025

[deluxestogie]

I thoroughly weeded the tobacco bed after lunch. Plucked a few suckers. The average first date for appearance of hornworm eggs (in my yard) is around 20 June. I see none so far.

I plan to mow the lawn tomorrow. I'll try to take "before and after" photos of the tobacco, to demonstrate how much the plants appear to grow in that 2 hours of mowing.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

Eight Havana 322 (NP) in the foreground, followed by six Lancaster seedleaf, with three Prilep 66-9/7 at the far end.

Before mowing

After mowing

I'm disappointed. My tobacco didn't grow at all during the two hours I mowed. When the tobacco plants are smaller, mowing appears to double their size (optical illusion). But...they are happy plants.

Bob

 

[Pj654]

So vibrant !!

 

[deluxestogie]

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

Last Call

This poor thing is a month late. After the demise of my previous Havana 322 (NP) in my porch corner bed, I waited and waited for this one remaining seedling to achieve a size that would encourage me to believe that it might have a chance of surviving in the ground. We shall see.

One of my reasons for always trying to grow at least one tobacco plant beside my front porch is that their blossoms attract hummingbirds. I'm afraid that, by the time this one blossoms (if it survives), the hummingbirds will have given up visiting. Although they seem to remember favorite blossom locations from year to year, I suspect that their memory of locations is tied to the calendar.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

This morning, I dragged my long garden hose out to the garden. The heat from the "heat dome" over the northeast US may as well be put to good use. I watered the veggies and tobacco, and will probably do that daily for a few days.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

It's going to be a toasty summer here.

Bob

 

[Hemlock]

This heat dome is expansive. Bob, would you know how high heat affects plant nicotine production (assuming well watered plants) I was thinking it would increase with resinous trichomes as a plant defense mechanism, but have not been able to find any research on this topic with key words searches.

 

[deluxestogie]

how high heat affects plant nicotine production

I'm not aware of any specific research on that. I would imagine that what we consider "high heat" for humans is typical of Nicotiana tabacum's original, sub-tropical habitat.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

In the close-up view of the tobacco, the taller plants are Lancaster seedleaf. To their right are Havana 322 (NP). You can compare the leaf shapes between them. The Lancaster is taller only because the stalks have increased the distances between leaf nodes faster than those of the Havana.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

The last seedling from my 1020 trays—a Prilep 66-9/7—has finally made it outdoors. Below, it is on the left of my porch corner bed (from which the garlic was removed). Havana 322 (NP) is to the right.

Below is one leaf of Havana 322 (NP) in the garden bed, showing the typical concentric circles and central necrosis of Tobacco Brown Spot (Alternaria alternata), a fungal disease. It tends to spread (disperse to other plants) during very dry weather, and to grow larger during damp weather. It makes for an ugly leaf with a hole, after curing, but is safe to smoke. So far, I see only this one spot on only one leaf.

Out in the garden bed, my Havana 322 (NP) is starting to show buds.

Below, the Lancaster seedleaf shows no sign of budding yet.

Finally, my three Prilep 66-9/7 in the garden bed are thriving.

No sign of hornworms yet.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

I detected no sign of this yesterday. This morning, the random leaf holes at the growth tip were obvious. Only a single plant appeared to be affected. The hole pattern is typical of certain of caterpillars—not hornworms. The victim was a lovely Lancaster Seedleaf.

In addition to the pattern of holes, the sprinkling of dark bits of caterpillar poop are easy to spot.

I slowly separated the tiny leaves with my fintertips, until I located the culprit. It's usually a single caterpillar, as it was this time. If the caterpillar is caught on the first day, the remainder of the plant grows normally, although with those permanent holes. (And as a damaged leaf grows larger, so do its holes, even though the caterpillar is long dead.) If caught a day later, then the growth tip itself may be damaged.

In this instance, the caterpillar was tiny, all green. Sorry. There's no photo of the caterpillar. It seems to have met with prompt squishing between my fingers. I smiled as I rubbed the bit of goo off my fingertips and into the dew-covered grass.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

As I was walking out to the garden to top some tobacco, a squadron of about 20 buzzing beetles, flying in a tight, orderly formation about 6 inches above the grass, cruised around the end of the tobacco bed, and plunged into a pile in the grass. By the time I was able to snap this photo, most of them had already lifted-off, and flown away randomly. If it was an orgy, it was a brief one.

They are Green June Beetles (not to be mistaken for June Bugs). It's July, but the beetles are June. Each one is about 1 inch long and ½ inch thick.

Of my 8 Havana 322 (NP) plants in the garden bed, 4 of them were within a day or so of opening their first blossom. The other 4 are comparative runts.

Using a pair of pruning shears, I removed the entire top, from the crow foot up, and also the portion of the stalk below the crow foot to a point just above the next lower leaf.

My logic for waiting to top at this point is to not trigger extensive suckers any earlier than necessary. I have not topped the runts. The advantage of topping all plants of a given variety simultaneously (as is done commercially) is that they will all mature at roughly the same time. Since that is seldom a consideration for my modest, home grow, my preference is to top each plant individually, maximizing productivity per plant.

Bob

 

[TigerTom]

As I was walking out to the garden to top some tobacco, a squadron of about 20 buzzing beetles, flying in a tight, orderly formation about 6 inches above the grass, cruised around the end of the tobacco bed, and plunged into a pile in the grass. By the time I was able to snap this photo, most of them had already lifted-off, and flown away randomly. If it was an orgy, it was a brief one.

They are Green June Beetles (not to be mistaken for June Bugs). It's July, but the beetles are June. Each one is about 1 inch long and ½ inch thick.

Those look a lot like the figeater beetles we have here on the West Coast. Whenever I find the grubs, I toss them into the coop and sit back while the chickens play "football".

 

[deluxestogie]

July 4 Celebration

Last evening, long before the sky was dark, the sounds of explosions began—coming from all directions. I was sitting on my front porch, smoking a cigar. Cannons to the left of me, cannons to the right of me, cannons in front of me volleyed and thundered.

A fawn sprinted from behind my house, and fled into the pasture. It circled the acreage, several times. Finally the doe appeared, and summoned the fawn to her side. Then the two of them together cautiously circled the pasture, never approaching any of its fences. The tree line seemed an obvious refuge, but the loudest and most frequent explosions were coming from that direction. The sky was blinking above them. Smoky lights flashed in all directions. I eventually lost sight of them, once darkness had fully set in.

The celebratory sounds of war continued for a while longer, then ceased before I went off to bed.

When morning came, there were no columns of smoke, no burning structures. All my neighbors homes seemed as peaceful as ever. When I was a boy, and then again when my son was a boy, setting off fireworks seemed like a wondrous thing to do. In my dotage, I have lost my enthusiasm for celebrating with intentional explosions. I suppose it is similar in its profligate abandon to the massive bonfires of more ancient days.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

First hornworm eggs (2) spotted today. Around 20 June has been typical until the past couple of years. I carefully removed each egg, and popped it between my fingertip and my thumbnail.

I began this morning with my weekly spraying of BT (Bacillus thuringiensis). This will limit any missed hornworm to eating nothing more than a tiny pinhole, prior to its death. Since I mix up the BT into a spray bottle (i.e. I have to squeeze the handle for each spray burst), my very small crop this season has minimized the forearm muscle aches of past years.

Bob

 

[Redleaf]

Your interest in vultures reminded me that there was a fellow here in Saskatchewan who did a massive study on vultures. I met up with a fellow near my farm who was part of the research team. Stuart Houston was the name of the professor who didthe study. As I recall it was a groundbreaking and lengthy project. i heard a radio interview with professor Houston and it was intersting to hear many details of their nesting, chick raising, scavenging, and migration. A quick search of the internet will find lots of info that came to light. For example the only time spent at the “nesting” site is hatching the young, then return visits to regurgitate food for the nestling. The only defence for the chicks is the vile smell.

 

[deluxestogie]

I'm currently reading a book on biogeography (Song of the Dodo). Although that book tends to focus on island biogeography, it applies in many senses to the manner in which we have cut up and created virtual ecological islands of what used to be contiguous forest or prairies, or even contiguous farm land.

I've seen a single, California Condor (great big vulture) flying high above the Grand Canyon. Most of the vultures that I've observed over the past half-century seem to circle above land parcels in which human-caused, animal mortality is the richest food source—rural highways, freshly mowed pastures. I suspect that part of their ongoing success is due to the fact that humans have no interest in eating them (or displaying taxidermy trophies of them). Big, sluggish birds that will gather stubbornly around road kill—easy hunting targets. I think vultures will continue to prosper in the future.

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

Below is a comparison of the heights of Lancaster Seedleaf vs. Havana 322 (NP), roughly head-height vs. chest height.

Today was the second of my weekly sprayings of BT, to mitigate hornworms and other caterpillars.

I purchase BT concentrate, then mix it as needed into this spray bottle. The agricultural experts recommend that BT be sprayed on both the upper and lower surfaces of each leaf. I disagree. Hornworms and other caterpillars eat through the full thickness of the lamina, so if only one surface has been sprayed with BT, they die. I am fairly casual about just spraying the BT over the tobacco. My sloppy approach has worked well for quite a number of years now.

[If you experience "tent caterpillars" in your fruit trees, BT can zap them as well.]

Bob

 

[deluxestogie]

Yesterday, I wondered if I should continue spraying BT weekly, since I had seen no sign of hornworms over the past week. I went ahead and sprayed, and posted that fact with an air of wisdom. This morning, I saw one sickly, tiny hornworm, which I squished. Despite my undertaking a truly tiny grow, and despite my thoroughly inspecting the plants and individual leaves daily, it still pays to do the BT spray weekly.

Bob