Starting out growing tobacco for cigars and possibly chew: @Bigborebob

[Wombat_smokes]

The yellowing looks normal to me. Old leaves turning yellow is ok. New leaves growing yellow is nutrient problems. As the small, juvenile leaves (that you aren't gonna harvest anyway) often fade before the large, desirable leaves reach maturity.

My condolences for early budding. Those plants won't amount to much, but they are giving you seeds to save for next year. They are also good for practicing the curing process.

 

[GreenDragon]

Your soil looks good. N.t. is a pretty heavy feeder, so it would not hurt to supplement with a balanced fertilizer like 10-10-10 if you did not mix some in when you prepped the bed. Compost is great for all around health and growth, but it's not regulated so you never know what the NPK value of it is. Use recommended rate for tomatoes. I think you're off to a good start. Also, it's fairly normal for those bottom leaves to drop after transplant.

 

[StoneCarver]

I'd recommend some mulch under and around the plants. That will help reduce the sand from caking the plants.
I use brown leaves from last fall for mulch. I've used straw before too.
What I do is lay down the mulch in late fall after tilling the soil and leave it there till spring. When I go to plant the tobacco, I just push aside the mulch to get down to the soil.
By the end of summer the leaf mulch is mostly broken down. And then the cycle repeats.

 

[Bigborebob]

Thanks for the advice everyone. I watered with a full dose of organic tomato fertilizer. I guess we'll see what happens over the next couple weeks until they're due for the next round of fertilizer per the instructions on the bottle. I think I may be a little impatient and need to chill and let nature do it's thing. I'll keep you all posted on the progress of the plants. I'll grab some mulch to put under the plants once the leaves are above ground level.