Old style fermenting without external heat source

[Ellis003]

Hello I collect old smoking memorabilia and came across a 1949 article from the UK saying to ferment tobacco by stacking the leaves in a bushel basket, would this work? Or do you think I still need a light/heat source? I'm assuming this is just a scaled down version of stacking them on top of each other that large plantations do but with a box to keep the heat in. If this wouldn't work would I be able to line a box with polystyrene or help keep the heat in but still without an external heat source?Any help would be great.

I'm trying to use a fermentation process that doesn't need a power source as the electric company are having my eyes out cost wise.

Cheers

 

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[deluxestogie]

Welcome to the forum, @Ellis003. Feel free to introduce yourself in the Introduce Yourself forum. You may wish to scan through the topics in our Index of Key Forum Threads.

One of this forum's founding members, @BigBonner, is a commercial tobacco grower in Kentucky. He has reported unintentional heating of fermentation within tobacco bales and stacks, but only under occasional environmental conditions. The pilon method used by traditional cigar tobacco growers seems to depend entirely on the thermal insulation provided by the periphery of the pilon, rather than the weight of compression of the stack. Size of a pilon determines insulation values. Only the horizontal and vertical center of the pilon heats itself. Heat is spontaneously generated by the exothermic reaction of oxidation.

I have attempted what you are hoping to do. I placed several tied hands of tobacco (a hundred or so leaves) closely together in high-case within a custom-made box of 3-inch thick, extruded polystyrene insulation board, and applied (as I recall) about 25 pounds of pressure to the top. My setup included a long-stem, compost thermometer. After observing the temperature for several weeks, I saw no change in the internal temperature, so I halted the experiment for fear of the leaf molding.

My conclusion is that the insulated box method would likely have worked in a tropical or sub-tropical environment, though not here in Virginia or anywhere in Germany—UNLESS—unless you add a heat source.

Bob

 

[Havok]

Store your leaf, in low case, within a container. Keep this container in a dark room in your home that stays fairly consistent around 20C. Inspect the tobacco thoroughly once monthly for mold, letting the leaves breathe for about 30-60minutes as you do so. Rehydrate as necessary (see other posts on this forum for ways to do that properly to avoid storing wet tobacco). After about 10-12 months you can start sampling the tobacco to see how it’s changed, but expect to continue this for another 8-12 months… depending on your tastes, I suppose. If, when you’ve come back to inspect your leaves, they are dry and brittle: don’t tally that towards a month of aging -and consider a better container. It doesn’t need to be air tight.

 

[Havok]

…I should add that I live in a very dry area. I think others in more humid areas do just fine in a cardboard box.

 

[GIL]

Summer is coming, the sun will be in the sky (during the day), this is the source of free energy. I have been doing it for several years; I harvest, I put the leaves in plastic bags up in the attic of my tin-covered house, and with that I forget about it. My only concern is to restore the humidity level twice a year. It works. When I need some leaves, I go up in the roof of the house and choose from the older harvests.
You can pack slightly moistened leaves in nylon or jars and leave them in the sun. It involves daily care but it is free.

 

[PressuredLeaf]

Another “free” method of you live in a warm environment is trunk kilning. I live in AZ and once the day time temps are above 95F the trunk of my car easily reaches 120F if its in the sun. For one of my grows, I took the color cured leaf and rehydrated it to low-medium case. I put it in large ziploc bags and tossed it in the trunk of my car. Occasionally, I would open the bags to air them out and check on the tobacco or rehydrate it. After a few months it was smelling really good, and similar to my proper kilned tobacco. One day I was picking up a relative from the airport and she remarked “do you have pipe tobacco in here? It smells like the pipe tobacco my grandpa used to smoke”. Unfortunately, a lot of that tobacco was extremely hard to burn due to improper fertilization during the growing season. Also, if you do try this method make sure you do it in the trunk, sunlight degraded tobacco quality after enough exposure.