When was tobacco cultivated

After a plant was topped, it tended to develop suckers, shoots that emerge where the leaf joins with the stem. These suckers were carefully removed by the plantation work force as well. If this weekly process were not performed, smaller leaves would result. Throughout its growth, tobacco was subject to the attack of numerous diseases and insects. Of all the pests in the tobacco field, the most feared was the horn worm, the same creature that attacks tomato plants.

Usually there were two periods in the summer when the worms, which could grow to the size of a man's finger, were at their worst. A plague of worms could destroy a crop in less than a week; planters learned to inspect each tobacco plant daily. Worms were picked off and crushed underfoot. The tobacco plants, standing six to nine feet high, were mature and ready to harvest by late August or early September.

Even if the planter had good weather and had avoided destruction by pests and diseases, his crop was still in danger. If the plant were harvested before it was fully mature or when its peak season had passed, it would be worth far less. On the other hand, if the tobacco stayed too long in the field, there was the risk of a frost destroying the entire crop. One of the skills of a Virginia cropmaster was the ability to judge just when the tobacco should be harvested.

An experienced planter would look at color a yellowish green , texture thick, rough and downy and pliancy a leaf that broke when it was folded between one's fingers. Since the plants ripened at different times, there were numerous trips to the field during harvest time. Plants were cut with a sharp knife between the bottom leaves and the ground.

If the weather were favorable, the tobacco was left on the ground three or four hours to wilt. This resulted in a heavier, moister leaf which brought a higher price. In the first few years of tobacco cultivation, the plants were simply covered with hay and left in the field to cure or "sweat. In addition, a better method of curing tobacco had been developed; the wilted leaves were hung on lines or sticks, at first outside on fence rails.

Tobacco barns for housing the crop were in use by the 's. During the curing period, which lasted between four and six weeks, the color of the tobacco changed from a greenish yellow to a light tan. Mold was a danger during this time. Once again, a planter relied on his experience to know when the tobacco was ready to removed from the sticks on which it hung, a process known as "striking.

At last, when the tobacco was ready, and during a period of damp weather, workers struck the tobacco and laid the leaves on the floor of the tobacco barn to sweat for a week or two. Logs could be used to press the tobacco and increase its temperature, but the heat might become too intense and mold spoil the crop. After sweating, the next step was sorting. Ideally, all the tobacco should be in a condition described by cropmasters as "in case. If tobacco were too damp, it would rot in transit; if too dry, it would crumble and be unsalable.

Although in the early years at Jamestown the settlers paid little heed to quality control, this attitude soon changed due to both the market and to regulations. Eventually, the settlers began to separate the tobacco into units of equal quality. The leaves were tied together in hands, bunches of five to Farmers received important information from NC State.

Blue mold probably existed in the western United States for many years as a minor disease on wild species of tobacco. It came east in but disappeared for ten years before resurfacing in It is caused by a fungus that attacks tobacco.

Dark air-cured tobaccos, used for chewing tobacco, grown in central Kentucky, central Tennessee, and north-central Virginia. Maryland tobaccos air-cured used for cigarette and smoking mixtures, grown in southern Maryland. Cigar tobaccos air-cured used for cigar wrappers and fillers, grown in the Connecticut Valley and small areas of Florida, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.

Flue-cured tobaccos, used for cigarette, pipe, and chewing tobacco, grown in southern Virginia, central and eastern North Carolina, eastern South Carolina, southern Georgia, southeastern Alabama, and northern Florida. Burley tobacco air-cured used for cigarette, pipe, and chewing tobacco, grown in central Kentucky, central and eastern Tennessee, southeastern Indiana, southern Ohio, western West Virginia, and western North Carolina.

Liggett and Brother, an American company established in St. Louis in Even though chewing tobacco was the most popular form of tobacco in the 19 th century R.

Reynolds Tobacco Company was founded in and produced chewing tobacco, exclusively cigarettes were slowly taking sway. Cigarettes truly came into popularity after the invention of the cigarette-making machine by James Bonsack in The ATC survives today as a part of British American Tobacco, a global company with reported revenues of 13, billion in Cigarettes came to the height of their popularity during the First and the Second World War.

Tobacco companies sent millions of packs of cigarettes to soldiers on the front lines, creating hundreds of thousands of faithful and addicted consumers in the process. The number of female smokers in the United States tripled by Dangers associated with nicotine are nothing new. Ever since people started smoking, there were those far-sighted enough to suggest that the habit is dangerous and addictive.

Alternative crops to tobacco: a gateway for tobacco farmers Ruvuma region, southern Tanzania. Tobacco Induced Diseases. American Journal of Public health , 9: View Countries X. Search for:. Alternative Livelihoods Indonesia Example. Download Image Data. Share Twitter Facebook LinkedIn. Hectares of Tobacco Planted. Tobacco Production. Food and Agriculture Organization United Nations.

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