Fermenting questions

[Rebeletoh]

Howdy! So, I'm working with about 50 plants and I've been experimenting with ways of fermenting... The best so far had been vacuum packing a small number of leaves and placing the bag in a constant 120 degree water bath... They come out smelling sweet and are much darker than when hang drying.
This next batch... I've got about 300 dried leaves and a few hundred more that I picked for drying today. The water bath had worked really well for small batches but with 300 leaves ready and a free hundred more on the way...I need to find a better way.
My thought was to moisten the dried leaves and pack them into a large plastic bin, then set it outside in the sun and check it daily for mossie and mold. I'd really like to not build a big fermenter that I'll only use once a year but still makes a huge footprint in my garage.
Any recommendations?

 

[deluxestogie]

Above about 122ºF, mold does not grow vegetatively. Mold spores are everywhere. Dry (dead) leaf that is kept moist below 122°F will mold in short order (like a few days).

The idea of a large tub in the sun sounds inviting, but unless the sun shines at night, as well as during day, in San Diego, you will end up with some nice compost.

I regularly grow about 125 to 150 plants each year. Each batch of leaf (fully color-cured already) that goes into my tobacco kiln stays there for 4 to 6 weeks. The kiln runs a minimum of several months per year. For a weekend of labor in construction, and about $100 to $150 in expense, you'll have a well controlled kiln that will not ruin large batches of leaf.

This is, of course, just my opinion on these matters. But I find the labor of producing tobacco too great to risk a crop on a fermentation method that is uncontrolled and not likely to be particularly effective.

Bob

 

[GreenDragon]

Not sure if it's the lighting, but the batch on the left side of the table looks very green.

 

[ChinaVoodoo]

Leaving tobacco in the sun in a tub will result in mold unless its barely moist enough to age, or you mix it up every day. Tobacco even in smokeable case will create condensation on the lid and outer walls which will collect in the bottom. The tobacco at the bottom will be at increased risk of mold. Personal experience.

 

[Rebeletoh]

Not sure if it's the lighting, but the batch on the left side of the table looks very green.

It is... Some of the strains we're growing have a white spine, some have green. Many of these leaves were picked too early while I was panicking and trying to control hornworms... Got that taken care of with bt-k. Anyway, all the leaves were hung at the same time in the same conditions. The white spine leaves dried yellow brown and the green stem leaves dried green/brown. I know the green means they dried too quickly for the chlorophyll to break down, right? I've thought about remoistening them and hanging them up again...

 

[GreenDragon]

I think you may need to write those off and chalk it up to experience. I don’t think re-hanging will color cure them if they dried out. You may get the green out by setting them out in the sun but they will probably still be pretty harsh tasting.