When to start and what spacing?

[prairiefarmer]

This will be my first attempt at growing tobacco. I live in central Illinois. Our last frost day is generally around April 20th, give or take a day or two. When should I plant my seedlings indoors? Secondly, under normal growing conditions how long will it be before they're ready to transplant outside? And lastly what do you guys think works best as far as plant spacing? Some guys say 4ft row with 3ft between plants, some say 3ft rows with 2ft between plants, and some even say 2ft by 2ft. What do you guys think is the most bang for the buck. I'm sure the closer the plants are, the smaller they'll be, but where's the trade off between "a lot" of smaller plants vs. "a few" big high yielding plants? Thanks!!

 

[deluxestogie]

If you'll be using a tractor for any part of the process, then probably 3' between plants in rows; 4' between rows--or whatever fits your equipment. Since you have the space, there would be little sense in denser planting. I would suggest starting germination ~6 to 8 weeks before last frost date, so right about now.

Bob

 

[prairiefarmer]

I'll probably be doing all the work by hand, but being my first year and all I think I'll do like you said and go with the wider rows, just to give me a little more room to work and get up and down the rows. I hope my seed will show up this week, so I can go ahead and get my plants started. I ordered it over a week ago so it should be in any day now. Thanks for your input!!

 

[DrBob]

24x36 is optimal for rototilling and leaves enough room for pruning suckers but it can get hard to move through as the plants get larger. If I had the extra space I would plant 24" apart with 42" row spacing it would be a lot easier to walk the rows. 24x24 spacing is ok for the plants but it is hard to prune at that spacing

 

[Daniel]

I had 4 feet between rows last hear and at the very end it got crowded and we ended up breaking a few leaves on the plants that where behind us. Mainly a clumsy newb thing. This year we have a lot more space so I am going 6 feet between row jsut to make more room for us when we work on it. I will have double rows with 18 inches between those rows. plants will be spaced at 2 feet apart and the rows will be offset or staggard. Hope that makes since. what this does is effectively makes all plants spaced about 2 feet from each other. THis will be a bti crowded for some of the larger varieties. about right for smaller ones. but some varieties such as Bursa should be spaced much much closer than this even. SO proper spacing does have some to do with the variety but for the most part I think you should space according to what works for you and makes tending the plants easier. there is a lot of hands on when it comes to tobacco.

Best of luck with your efforts this year.