FOH Mould Study

[David C]

I’ve been in a battle with cigar mold for more than 10 years now. I’ve been using this “quarantine” set up for 5 years.

(Step 1) I unwrap the cigar box and transfer cigars (without touching them) into a brand new acrylic jar.

(Step 2) I use Boveda humidipaks

(Step 3) I dispose of the cigars that have any non-white mold. (Rare)

(Step 4) I dispose of the cigars that have white mold that smells bad. (Rare)

 

Although I’m quite certain that “plume” is BS at this point. I’ve seen a pattern that may explain the appearance of plume. 

(1) It is rare, but (less than 1 out of every 15) jars grow mold that is dark in color. (In the past 5 years, all were from new boxes, shortly after purchase)

(2) Of the 11 jars that currently have “plume aka white mold”, 7 of those jars contain cigars that didn’t come with cellophane wrappers. 

(3) Of the 21 jars that currently do not have mold (yet), ALL of them have cellophane wrappers. (+2 jars for randoms in another cabinet)

 

I’ve removed myself as a source of mold to the best of my ability. However, I must open the jars to remove a cigar to smoke, and to replace humidipaks.  Excluding cigars that were pre-humidipaks and pre-quarantine, I’ve only found dark mold on cigars shortly after purchase. I think it’s likely that I (or someone) contaminated most cigars that lack cellophane. Also, I think the white mold that grows under the cellophane is present before purchase. Mold could be common or unavoidable when aging cigars.  HOWEVER, even a cigar shop that does well to wipe mold from visible inventory can’t expect to find all of it. This is, I think, the real issue here. Some mold is possibly bad. Some mold is possibly harmless. Is it true that white mold will grow on roughly 17% cigars, even when stored optimally? Is that an acceptable loss to a cigar store’s bottom line? Regardless, plume is probably mold but we’re still unsure, after nearly 30 years with the World Wide Web. 

[CigarNerd]

Just some additional information to not mix things up:

Contamination with mold is unavoidable: you don't have to touch cigars, the mold spurs are everywhere... in cuba, in nicaragua, in your jars everywhere.
You inhale mold spurs with every breath you take. Typically your imune system is capable of handling them, sometimes it fails (see aspergillosis).

Every coloured mold was white in the beginning. However, some mold does not change colour and stays white throughout the whole life cycle. But this type is rather rare.
For me this explains pretty well, why you see white mold more often than coloured mold: nobody waits for the white mold to turn green.
You'd wipe the mold off before that happens.

I've made some pictures of this "colour-change":

 

example above: Those white pinheads somehow "pop open" and change their colour from white to green after some time, but only if the conditions are right.
They can also stay white for a prolonged amount of time.

[cmitch]

Noting that the specimens in the second batch were determined to be mostly Bacterial growth. That is troubling, especially considering one person who mentioned in this topic he witnessed rollers sneezing on the cigars. In November 2015, I got terribly sick which brought me to hospitalization in ICU in December 2015. It was determined I had mycoplasma infection in the lungs. There are 2 outcomes: Death or recovery. The reason is that in order to determine WHAT infection you have so it can be treated, can require more than 2 weeks of lab testing. Either you are young and have the constitution to recover from the infection or you're too young or too old to survive it. After it was diagnosed, I completed a regimen of antibiotics that cleaned the rest of it out. But the mystery was: Where did I get it? Doctor seemed to think I would have had to breathe in the mycoplasma in order to be infected. Was a cigar I smoked 'infected' with it? Who knows? But mycoplasma is a tough cookie because it is unlike most bacteria: It has no cell wall, hence why antibiotics don't work or at least your typical ones. I would be very careful to smoke any cigar that had molds, fungi, or other unidentifiable crud on it. My lungs are scarred (interstitial tissue scarring) for the rest of my shortened life due to this issue. Guys, it is simply not worth your health. If you don't know conclusively what it is, TOSS IT!

"Mycoplasma are a mollicute genus of bacteria that lack a cell wall around their cell membranes. This characteristic, makes them naturally resistant to many common antibiotics such as penicillin or other beta-lactam antibiotics that target cell wall synthesis. They can be parasitic or saprotrophic."

[Gamehawker]

Wow,

Quite an interesting and informative read.

[MD Puffer]

On 10/8/2018 at 4:30 PM, cmitch said:

Noting that the specimens in the second batch were determined to be mostly Bacterial growth. That is troubling, especially considering one person who mentioned in this topic he witnessed rollers sneezing on the cigars. In November 2015, I got terribly sick which brought me to hospitalization in ICU in December 2015. It was determined I had mycoplasma infection in the lungs. There are 2 outcomes: Death or recovery. The reason is that in order to determine WHAT infection you have so it can be treated, can require more than 2 weeks of lab testing. Either you are young and have the constitution to recover from the infection or you're too young or too old to survive it. After it was diagnosed, I completed a regimen of antibiotics that cleaned the rest of it out. But the mystery was: Where did I get it? Doctor seemed to think I would have had to breathe in the mycoplasma in order to be infected. Was a cigar I smoked 'infected' with it? Who knows? But mycoplasma is a tough cookie because it is unlike most bacteria: It has no cell wall, hence why antibiotics don't work or at least your typical ones. I would be very careful to smoke any cigar that had molds, fungi, or other unidentifiable crud on it. My lungs are scarred (interstitial tissue scarring) for the rest of my shortened life due to this issue. Guys, it is simply not worth your health. If you don't know conclusively what it is, TOSS IT!

"Mycoplasma are a mollicute genus of bacteria that lack a cell wall around their cell membranes. This characteristic, makes them naturally resistant to many common antibiotics such as penicillin or other beta-lactam antibiotics that target cell wall synthesis. They can be parasitic or saprotrophic."

Mycoplasmal pneumonia, aka "walking pneumonia" is a very common community acquired pneumonia.  M. pneumoniae is highly fastidious- that's why it took the lab 2 weeks to culture.  Cigars/tobacco are not a a feasible substrate for it to grow upon, let alone survive.  

The most likely and reasonable explanation is someone in your vicinity had it, coughed, and you breathed in the same air.  Your attending physician ordered lab testing because you had to be stabilized in the ICU, apparently were not responding to antibiotic treatment, and needed to show he ordered all reasonable tests in case you died and someone sued him.  Your vitals had to have been in the crapper or at least trending there for them to have put you in the ICU, unless you're really old or immunocompromised and you were admitted there as a precautionary measure (but seriously, even then you would have been admitted to a gen med ward if you were otherwise stable).

Most people survive these infections without any treatment because the symptoms are frequently mild and easily mistaken for seasonal allergies.  The absence of a cell wall just makes them resistant to a few classes of antibiotics but they're highly susceptible to a wide range of other and they don't show the prevalence of antibiotic resistance seen with other bacteria (most likely owing to their longer generation times).  So it's not like there's a paucity of antibiotic treatment available.  A ten dollar Z-pack typically suffices in most cases.  Cultures are almost never obtained and the treatment is almost always empirical.  

If you were my patient in residency, I would have presented your case in grand rounds because almost everybody who gets walking pneumonia either is satisfactorily treated with common antibiotics or just weathers the storm.  Also, you don't have interstitial lung disease from a mycoplasmal infection.  Mycoplasma is no tough cookie- it's easily treated (most often). 

Since I have some time to kill, I will digress.

What other bacterial pathogens might be lurking about on your CCs?

Staph.  It's in everyone's noses.  These guys are breathing dust all day, and smoke, and sneezing (as above).  Someone's gonna pick their nose then roll a piramide.  I bet you staph could be easily cultured from a cigar.  Threat?  Realistically?  Next to nil.  Staph is on everyone.  It's already in your nose and oropharynx.  Good survival rate outside of the host.  But unless your immunocompromised I don't see it infecting a cigar smoker- it's not like Cuban staph is more pathogenic than American staph.  

E. Coli (and other  coliforms).  Hah.  Nasty.  Someone didn't wash their hands after their government sanctioned potty break.  And you wondered why that HDM Ep 1 looked like a maduro wrapper.  Tsk tsk.  Threat?  Realistically?  Next to nil.  It doesn't have as great a survival rate outside their host for one.  This fact makes one wonder how much crap exactly is on one's Romaine lettuce.  The answer is not enough because Caesar salad is fucking delicious and I'm going to continue to eat it.  Plus, it's also already in your gut and you'd need to ingest a minimum inoculum for infection with one of the strains that are known to be pathogenic.  Hypothetically, it could be the opposite.  You could be sick with "bad" E. coli and ingesting good coliforms from your torcedor.  Sort of a de facto fecal transplant.  Yeah, those are real.  When I was an intern my chief and attending were talking about a patient with C. diff who was crumping.  The former proposed a fecal transplant.  Despite both of them trying to convince me that they weren't pulling my leg I refused to believe it until I read some journal articles on it.  True story.  I shit you not.  

Honorable mention:  Tuberculosis.  Now this guy is a tough cookie.  You see, outside of his cell wall he makes a waxy-like coating which makes it difficult to ID under a microscope, difficult to culture, and difficult to get the antibiotics across this hydrophobic waxy coating.  Given that we're talking about a 3rd world country, sneezing/coughing on cigars which would act as fomites that we later stick in our mouths and draw smoke through, one might think this is possible.  Yeah, it's possible.  It's also possible OJ didn't kill his wife.  Apparently, Cuba has TB under control.  But if they didn't, and TB was a problem there, then that'd be the one that concerned me.  It's wax-like coating lends to long survival rates outside the host and the minimum inoculum to infect is 1 or 2 cells (ie highly infectious).

I don't know if the phenomena of crystallized oils on the surface of wrappers (aka plume) exists.  I know something similar does exist on potent strains of marijuana.  But different.  It's really more of a dessicated oozing of sap (which can be collected into little sticky balls of hasish).  What I find odd is that no one has ever published any photo of a cigar wrapper with what is called plume and shown it to be anything other than mycelium.  Forget electron microscopy- just an old school light microscopy photo of some crystals.  I have never seen a photo of such but I have heard countless people swear by its existance.

I'm not not sickly, not immunocompromised, and I have no pulmonary diseases.  So if I find a little white mold on a cigar, I personally imagine it to be something akin to a secondary or tertiary fermentation.  If it's extensive I'm going to wipe it off, and if it's hardly noticeable I probably wouldn't risk damaging the wrapper or wasting my time and just smoke it up.  Why?  I can't find any documented cases of pulmonary fungal infections thought to be caused by smoking cigars.  How many hundreds of millions of cigars a made and smoked each year?  And not one case of a pulmonary fungal infection from a tainted cigar?  They are all covered with fungal spores or mycelium.  A big factor is we don't inhale this smoke, at least directly. 

Now, Aspergillus can be blue and/or green.  There are also documented cases of aspergillosis from marijuana (unique epidemic in some po dunk town).  But you inhale that smoke (though not everyone apparently).  So, if I ever saw something blue or green growning on a cigar I'd probably not smoke it. 

There's an interesting irony here.  Some people who are smoking cigars are worried about their health by smoking cigars which have an advanced degree of growth of an ubiquitous fungus.  I think most likely plume is the white rind of brie to cigars.

 

[mt1]

One of my favorite things to do is go into cigar shops, note any mold, and after I'm inevitably told about plume/bloom/ploom, I offer to buy the cigar if the shopkeeper is willing to lick it off.  Nobody has taken me up on it so far.

I've always assumed all of it is mold.  I've seen some older cigars with a "dust" all over them which may be bloom, but it seems it's still mold according to this thread.  Which is all fine, really, I prefer clean cigars anyway.

[Derboesekoenig]

11 hours ago, MD Puffer said:

Mycoplasmal pneumonia, aka "walking pneumonia" is a very common community acquired pneumonia.  M. pneumoniae is highly fastidious- that's why it took the lab 2 weeks to culture.  Cigars/tobacco are not a a feasible substrate for it to grow upon, let alone survive.  

The most likely and reasonable explanation is someone in your vicinity had it, coughed, and you breathed in the same air.  Your attending physician ordered lab testing because you had to be stabilized in the ICU, apparently were not responding to antibiotic treatment, and needed to show he ordered all reasonable tests in case you died and someone sued him.  Your vitals had to have been in the crapper or at least trending there for them to have put you in the ICU, unless you're really old or immunocompromised and you were admitted there as a precautionary measure (but seriously, even then you would have been admitted to a gen med ward if you were otherwise stable).

Most people survive these infections without any treatment because the symptoms are frequently mild and easily mistaken for seasonal allergies.  The absence of a cell wall just makes them resistant to a few classes of antibiotics but they're highly susceptible to a wide range of other and they don't show the prevalence of antibiotic resistance seen with other bacteria (most likely owing to their longer generation times).  So it's not like there's a paucity of antibiotic treatment available.  A ten dollar Z-pack typically suffices in most cases.  Cultures are almost never obtained and the treatment is almost always empirical.  

If you were my patient in residency, I would have presented your case in grand rounds because almost everybody who gets walking pneumonia either is satisfactorily treated with common antibiotics or just weathers the storm.  Also, you don't have interstitial lung disease from a mycoplasmal infection.  Mycoplasma is no tough cookie- it's easily treated (most often). 

Since I have some time to kill, I will digress.

What other bacterial pathogens might be lurking about on your CCs?

Staph.  It's in everyone's noses.  These guys are breathing dust all day, and smoke, and sneezing (as above).  Someone's gonna pick their nose then roll a piramide.  I bet you staph could be easily cultured from a cigar.  Threat?  Realistically?  Next to nil.  Staph is on everyone.  It's already in your nose and oropharynx.  Good survival rate outside of the host.  But unless your immunocompromised I don't see it infecting a cigar smoker- it's not like Cuban staph is more pathogenic than American staph.  

E. Coli (and other  coliforms).  Hah.  Nasty.  Someone didn't wash their hands after their government sanctioned potty break.  And you wondered why that HDM Ep 1 looked like a maduro wrapper.  Tsk tsk.  Threat?  Realistically?  Next to nil.  It doesn't have as great a survival rate outside their host for one.  This fact makes one wonder how much crap exactly is on one's Romaine lettuce.  The answer is not enough because Caesar salad is fucking delicious and I'm going to continue to eat it.  Plus, it's also already in your gut and you'd need to ingest a minimum inoculum for infection with one of the strains that are known to be pathogenic.  Hypothetically, it could be the opposite.  You could be sick with "bad" E. coli and ingesting good coliforms from your torcedor.  Sort of a de facto fecal transplant.  Yeah, those are real.  When I was an intern my chief and attending were talking about a patient with C. diff who was crumping.  The former proposed a fecal transplant.  Despite both of them trying to convince me that they weren't pulling my leg I refused to believe it until I read some journal articles on it.  True story.  I shit you not.  

Honorable mention:  Tuberculosis.  Now this guy is a tough cookie.  You see, outside of his cell wall he makes a waxy-like coating which makes it difficult to ID under a microscope, difficult to culture, and difficult to get the antibiotics across this hydrophobic waxy coating.  Given that we're talking about a 3rd world country, sneezing/coughing on cigars which would act as fomites that we later stick in our mouths and draw smoke through, one might think this is possible.  Yeah, it's possible.  It's also possible OJ didn't kill his wife.  Apparently, Cuba has TB under control.  But if they didn't, and TB was a problem there, then that'd be the one that concerned me.  It's wax-like coating lends to long survival rates outside the host and the minimum inoculum to infect is 1 or 2 cells (ie highly infectious).

I don't know if the phenomena of crystallized oils on the surface of wrappers (aka plume) exists.  I know something similar does exist on potent strains of marijuana.  But different.  It's really more of a dessicated oozing of sap (which can be collected into little sticky balls of hasish).  What I find odd is that no one has ever published any photo of a cigar wrapper with what is called plume and shown it to be anything other than mycelium.  Forget electron microscopy- just an old school light microscopy photo of some crystals.  I have never seen a photo of such but I have heard countless people swear by its existance.

I'm not not sickly, not immunocompromised, and I have no pulmonary diseases.  So if I find a little white mold on a cigar, I personally imagine it to be something akin to a secondary or tertiary fermentation.  If it's extensive I'm going to wipe it off, and if it's hardly noticeable I probably wouldn't risk damaging the wrapper or wasting my time and just smoke it up.  Why?  I can't find any documented cases of pulmonary fungal infections thought to be caused by smoking cigars.  How many hundreds of millions of cigars a made and smoked each year?  And not one case of a pulmonary fungal infection from a tainted cigar?  They are all covered with fungal spores or mycelium.  A big factor is we don't inhale this smoke, at least directly. 

Now, Aspergillus can be blue and/or green.  There are also documented cases of aspergillosis from marijuana (unique epidemic in some po dunk town).  But you inhale that smoke (though not everyone apparently).  So, if I ever saw something blue or green growning on a cigar I'd probably not smoke it. 

There's an interesting irony here.  Some people who are smoking cigars are worried about their health by smoking cigars which have an advanced degree of growth of an ubiquitous fungus.  I think most likely plume is the white rind of brie to cigars.

 

I really am starting to regret reading this. Very informative. Thank you....I think lol. 

[JIK]

Lots of interesting info. I have some pipe tobacco somewhere in my stash that has a crystalline appearance to the naked eye. Is that something you guys would like to test? 

[adwinistrator]

Thanks for this super informative thread, and thanks to all the people putting the work in to get to the bottom of this!

For the sake of the "crystallized oils" investigation, I thought I'd share a video I took of a slightly aged AF Anejo that was sparkling and glistening in the light...  This is what I'd expect something like crystallized oils to look like (not dust or fuzz).

I don't have the equipment to take such super zoom photos, but if anyone really considers this to be the mythical crystalline structures, I'd be down for sending one in.

[CigarNerd]

I'd love to take some fotos of this stick. Where are you from? I'm from Austria.

[adwinistrator]

2 minutes ago, CigarNerd said:

I'd love to take some fotos of this stick. Where are you from? I'm from Austria.

Buffalo, NY, USA.

I smoked the stick in the video, but purchased a few more out of the same box.  I can verify the same lighting effect on another before picking one to send (whether to you, or the FoH guys if they want to test).

[CigarNerd]

Are the FoH guys still sending sticks to a lab for analysis?
If yes, this would be the better option.
If no, I'd be more than happy to take some macro shots.

[Kaptain Karl]

On 1/29/2019 at 8:24 AM, adwinistrator said:

Thanks for this super informative thread, and thanks to all the people putting the work in to get to the bottom of this!

For the sake of the "crystallized oils" investigation, I thought I'd share a video I took of a slightly aged AF Anejo that was sparkling and glistening in the light...  This is what I'd expect something like crystallized oils to look like (not dust or fuzz).

I don't have the equipment to take such super zoom photos, but if anyone really considers this to be the mythical crystalline structures, I'd be down for sending one in.

That's characteristic of Connecticut broadleaf wrappers 

[MD Puffer]

On 1/29/2019 at 10:24 AM, adwinistrator said:

Thanks for this super informative thread, and thanks to all the people putting the work in to get to the bottom of this!

For the sake of the "crystallized oils" investigation, I thought I'd share a video I took of a slightly aged AF Anejo that was sparkling and glistening in the light...  This is what I'd expect something like crystallized oils to look like (not dust or fuzz).

Very compelling!  Lovely cigar too.  I'd love nothing more than the crystallized oils known as plume to be real and genuine- but I wouldn't draw too many conclusions from that video clip.  Barring photographic artifact, a macroscopic picture or video tells us little.  We need magnification.  It really wouldn't take a whole cigar.  We only want to know if those sparkles are crystals or mycelium.  A razor, a 5mmX5mm piece of the sparkly wrapper (a humble but significant sacrifice), and a decent light microscope should be able to give you a really good idea of the sparkly stuff is mycelium but it may or may not be enough to visualize crystalline structures.  Technically, a light microscope is enough to visualize the gross structure of many crystals but the specimen often requires immersion in a special oil to allow you to use the higher power objectives.  If the sparkly stuff was crystallized tobacco oils, I wonder if the immersion oil would cause it to go back into solution.  I don't have any idea, I've never prepped slides of anything but microbes.  But at least light microscope on low power should be able to demonstrate whether it was mycelium.  That's where my money would be if I bet.  Which I don't because I'd rather spend it on cigars.  Lovely sparkle though.  Just to be clear-  you don't have any girls ages 6-14 living in the home do you?  The whole lot of them tend to be infected with glitteritis and it's very contagious stuff.  So the list to rule out...

1.  Artifact

2. Glitter

3.  Mycelium

4. Crystallized oil (in which case you have the unicorn of the cigar world!)

The best imaging would be scanning electron microscopy.  But unless you have a million bucks to blow (and about 25K or more per year in servicing) then a simple old school light microscope would have to suffice- and good versions of those aren't cheap either.  And if you did, wouldn't you rather spend that money on cigars and food and traveling?  

 

 

[adwinistrator]

On 2/4/2019 at 9:25 PM, MD Puffer said:

Very compelling!  Lovely cigar too.  I'd love nothing more than the crystallized oils known as plume to be real and genuine- but I wouldn't draw too many conclusions from that video clip.  Barring photographic artifact, a macroscopic picture or video tells us little.  We need magnification.  It really wouldn't take a whole cigar.  We only want to know if those sparkles are crystals or mycelium.  A razor, a 5mmX5mm piece of the sparkly wrapper (a humble but significant sacrifice), and a decent light microscope should be able to give you a really good idea of the sparkly stuff is mycelium but it may or may not be enough to visualize crystalline structures.  Technically, a light microscope is enough to visualize the gross structure of many crystals but the specimen often requires immersion in a special oil to allow you to use the higher power objectives.  If the sparkly stuff was crystallized tobacco oils, I wonder if the immersion oil would cause it to go back into solution.  I don't have any idea, I've never prepped slides of anything but microbes.  But at least light microscope on low power should be able to demonstrate whether it was mycelium.  That's where my money would be if I bet.  Which I don't because I'd rather spend it on cigars.  Lovely sparkle though.  Just to be clear-  you don't have any girls ages 6-14 living in the home do you?  The whole lot of them tend to be infected with glitteritis and it's very contagious stuff.  So the list to rule out...

1.  Artifact

2. Glitter

3.  Mycelium

4. Crystallized oil (in which case you have the unicorn of the cigar world!)

The best imaging would be scanning electron microscopy.  But unless you have a million bucks to blow (and about 25K or more per year in servicing) then a simple old school light microscope would have to suffice- and good versions of those aren't cheap either.  And if you did, wouldn't you rather spend that money on cigars and food and traveling?  

 

 

No glitter contamination to worry about.

It's not an artifact, I took the video because I noticed the sparkling under the light in person, and figured I should document it before I set it on fire.

I do think, as @Kaptain Karl points out, it is very likely to just be the characteristics of the Conn wrapper...  oily, toothy, rough, and dark.  Combine that with some overhead lighting in a dim room, and you could get this effect without crystallization.

Whoever has the means to micro-photograph one of these sticks, I'll gladly send one their way, as long as they smoke it and write a review when they're done.

[LeafLegionWW]

On 1/29/2019 at 11:24 AM, adwinistrator said:

Thanks for this super informative thread, and thanks to all the people putting the work in to get to the bottom of this!

For the sake of the "crystallized oils" investigation, I thought I'd share a video I took of a slightly aged AF Anejo that was sparkling and glistening in the light...  This is what I'd expect something like crystallized oils to look like (not dust or fuzz).

I don't have the equipment to take such super zoom photos, but if anyone really considers this to be the mythical crystalline structures, I'd be down for sending one in.

I sent in a cigar that had this exact same sparkle and i sent a video like this to Rob before hand........it was mould.

[cmitch]

On 11/25/2018 at 9:14 PM, MD Puffer said:

 

If you were my patient in residency, I would have presented your case in grand rounds because almost everybody who gets walking pneumonia either is satisfactorily treated with common antibiotics or just weathers the storm.  Also, you don't have interstitial lung disease from a mycoplasmal infection.  Mycoplasma is no tough cookie- it's easily treated (most often). 

 

Unfortunately, my pulmonologist, respiratory therapist, and hospital resident would wholeheartedly disagree with the statement mycoplasma did not cause my interstitial scarring. Not only did mycoplasma scar my lungs, it is listed as the most common cause of interstitial scarring. My aunt had interstitial scarring from walking pneumonia and it cost her both of her lungs and eventually her life. She underwent heart lung transplant at University Alabama Birmingham in 1991. Most interstitial swelling or inflamation clears up on its own without the scarring. I lost 15% breathing capacity because of this. So it naturally caused concern for me possibly getting this infection from a cigar I smoked though the likely cause is what you said. Exposure from sputum coughed by another infected individual. But I am now more careful with cigars. If I see mold, it goes. I'm not smoking it.

[moy71]

This is one of the most interesting topics I have come across.  I so wanted to believe in the plume theory but alas...

[Kayslay]

On ‎11‎/‎15‎/‎2017 at 6:07 AM, KnightsAnole said:

Were any of the cigars with ‘plume’ stored in cello? I wonder if cello would affect, in a positive or negative way, these mold and bacterial growths? Great work guys, this is fascinating.

I have seen plenty of NC cigars with, well I guess reading this, mold in the cello after only being on the shelf for a matter of months. I would imagine the cello would trap moisture, although I know cello does transmit humidity over time.

[MasterYotti]

Very interesting read! Thank you so much for putting this information together! Wondering if there has been any updates or further research? ?

Plume/Ploom/Bloom seemingly is like Santa Claus, he will only arrive and gift you presents if you BELIEVE! ?

[SmokeHouse84]

Thank you for doing this study! It's valuable information! This was good reading! I WAS a believer of plume till recently. I have never had a cigar that I even thought had any plume on it. I recently got an order in (not from here), and all 16 Vegueros were covered in mold. I messaged the vendor, after being asked how I liked my order, to let them know not even expecting him to do anything about it because I assumed it just would have been from shipping, and he kept telling me I didn't know what I was talking about and that he had much more experience in the cigar world than me and I should listen to him, because it was only plume and the cigars were fine to smoke, then just outwardly started insulting me. The arrogance of some people is just frustrating, if I see "plume" mold on the foot I'm not risking anything.

 

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

 

 

 

Had to throw in a couple pictures when I put the mold under my microscope.

[ha_banos]

Wow. Arrogance and insults don't sit well with me. Mind pm me the seller? Just so I can make sure he's struck off my list.

Nice that you have a microscope. Show the vendor the 'crystals' of plume and let's see where he goes. I presume you've sent him this thread.

[SmokeHouse84]

Wow. Arrogance and insults don't sit well with me. Mind pm me the seller? Just so I can make sure he's struck off my list.
Nice that you have a microscope. Show the vendor the 'crystals' of plume and let's see where he goes. I presume you've sent him this thread.

Pm sent

Sent from my SM-G975U using Tapatalk

[kalibratecuba]

I don't see a problem.

Sent from my GM1917 using Tapatalk
 

[Meesterjojo]

Here to flog this topic a bit, Forgive me.

Have we considered that the tobacco of folks insisting plume is real may be different than tobacco now? Wasn't there a major change in cuban crops around the year 2000?

Also, plume sounds exactly like tricome expression. Obviously tobacco doesn't have that structure, but the way plume has been described from the past reminds me exactly of reading old issues of high times from back when describing the growing techniques requires to garner vibrant, healthy, tricomes on Marijuana. 

Another thing which I haven't seen mentioned in this discussion is the mold found- are these somehow unique species which are entirely contained on the surface, or as we suspect, just the reproductive structures with a hidden, larger, mycelium which has already compromised the interior of the cigar much the way mold on a bread loaf will have already spread to every slice, not just the one displaying mold?

Forgive me if my inquiries and observations are silly. Thank you for your consideration.