Growing Dark air cured tobacco. Red rose? Suggestions?

[DreadApache]

I have become a huge fan of dark air cured. I bought it from WLT and absolutely loved it. I have been growing tobacco for a few years and want to do some dark air cured next. I was looking at a list of different dark tobaccos there are many and the only one that is familiar is Red Rose. Having been raised and still living in a Jamaican neighborhood all my life, Red Rose actually comes up frequently on the street and in pop culture.

Has anyone grown red rose? What variety is WLT's dark air? Any suggestions for a large plant that yields a lot and has that bold and intricate taste, high nicotine like WLT's leaf?

Thanks in advance.

 

[ProZachJ]

Others may be able to speak to the taste and strength but for me this year Staghorn have been large, beautiful, and hardy.
The whole row on the left is Staghorn, the lighter color in front is due to the standing water near those plants.

 

[wruk53]

I have become a huge fan of dark air cured. I bought it from WLT and absolutely loved it. I have been growing tobacco for a few years and want to do some dark air cured next. I was looking at a list of different dark tobaccos there are many and the only one that is familiar is Red Rose. Having been raised and still living in a Jamaican neighborhood all my life, Red Rose actually comes up frequently on the street and in pop culture.

Has anyone grown red rose? What variety is WLT's dark air? Any suggestions for a large plant that yields a lot and has that bold and intricate taste, high nicotine like WLT's leaf?

Thanks in advance.

I've only grown 4 dark varieties: Small Stalk Black Mammoth, One-Sucker, Ainaro and Little Yellow. SSBM is a good yielder with high nicotine, but it is somewhat susceptible to brown spot. OS does not yield as much as the others but has the highest nicotine content and is not as susceptible to disease. Ainaro is probably the highest yielder but only has medium nicotine content. Ainaro is classified as a Dark variety, but I believe it should be classed as a primitive variety, it suckers a lot, and the leaves are widely spaced on the stalk. Little Yellow is probably my favorite as far as taste and smell, but it is also susceptible to brown spot and only has medium nicotine.

My go-to variety is One-Sucker due to the high nicotine content and disease resistance.

If you haven't already done so, go to Northwood seeds and review their Dark varieties. https://northwoodseeds.com/Seed List2.htm

Pennsylvania Green River One Sucker (GROS)​

This dark air cured variety is the same variety grown in Tennessee, Kentucky and Virginia for many years. It has been grown in Pennsylvania since 2005 as a result of the abolishment of the governmental quota system. Since the inception of this variety in 2005, it has become an integral component of the snus and moist snuff industry. Attractive characteristics include a thick bodied leaf with excellent absorption capacity and a high nicotine level. Nicotine levels are typically 6.7 – 7.2.

I'm not absolutely sure this is the same variety that I have, but the description fits, long, narrow thick leaves and very high nicotine content. I got my seeds from Northwood seeds. The above paragraph was copied from the Lancaster Leaf Tobacco Company site.

 

[johnny108]

Has anyone been able to identify what specific variety is being grown in the Green River area to produce their GROS?

Edit: nicotianaproject lists KY-153, KY-157, KY-160, SI KY-160, LN KY-160, KY-165, LN KY-171, IG KY-171, SI KY-171, OS400, and one simply called One Sucker.

 

[Knucklehead]

Could GROS be Green River One Sucker?
I don't know what is green river or GROS.

 

[johnny108]

Yes- sorry if my acronym was unclear- GROS is Green River One Sucker.
It’s a class of tobacco grown in a specific region (think “Napa Valley Red wine”), it is a class (I believe) of tobacco, not a specific strain. I am attempting to find out what specific strain is being used by growers in the Green River Valley area, to produce this high nicotine/flavor variety. If I can find that, then look at what practices the farmers are using (probably industry standard dark-air cured agricultural advice from the universities), maybe I can duplicate it….

 

[deluxestogie]

Kentucky Air-Cured Type 36 Green River One Sucker is a categorical subdivision based on the 19th century location of the crop—in the region of the Green River watershed in Kentucky.

Green River (Kentucky) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

The subdivision includes numerous specific dark air-cured varieties.

Bob

 

[DreadApache]

Others may be able to speak to the taste and strength but for me this year Staghorn have been large, beautiful, and hardy.
The whole row on the left is Staghorn, the lighter color in front is due to the standing water near those plants.View attachment 51096

That's awesome. I got some Stag Horn seeds for next year. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

[DreadApache]

I ended up ordering my seeds for next year and got them. I got Stag Horn for dark. I also got some cherry red, African red and Hyang Cho primitive. I really get a kick out of growing things that are less common.

 

[Huffen'Snuff]

I'm in Pennsylvania, where can the Pa Green River One Sucker seed be located for the 2025 season?

 

[johnny108]

I'm in Pennsylvania, where can the Pa Green River One Sucker seed be located for the 2025 season?

Northwood Seeds

 

[deluxestogie]

Doug Moats' Nicotiana Project (now gone) identified 11 different tobacco varieties named "One Sucker". The variety available from Northwood Seeds (PI 146959) is listed on ARS-GRIN, but with zero meaningful information.

Bob

 

[johnny108]

The Nicotiana Project listed various strains of KY171, which northwood seeds does carry, along with the stronger PY variant.

 

[plantdude]

A thumbs up for staghorn, but not quite a true dark in my mind although it's a great tobacco worth growing. It's hard to go wrong with that one and it air cures a nice dark reddish color. I think Skychaser lists it as a dark Virginian.

Madole is a good dark variety. I have had good luck growing it with no disease issues in my area. It air cures darker in color than staghorn and has a noticeably different flavor profile to it - stronger.

I've never tried any of the one suckers or Ky171 so I can't comment on those.

 

[Huffen'Snuff]

I figured "Pa G.r.o.s." would be a stretch, maybe I should check to see what "One Sucker" is being grown in Lancaster by the local Amish farms. Thanks guys, I find everything to do with the seed names,or varieties totally confusing. It's like there are names associated by a particular grower than the next hand on that seed line strips it back to the Latin name, then the next hand on it will name the phenotype, then the next guy in line of dissent with the seed will strip it back to latin, a hundred times over until there is nothing identifiable, I just don't understand any of it.

 

[Huffen'Snuff]

I'm pretty much at the point I'm going to buy all the different seeds then I'm gonna dump them all in the same container shake it up and plant as many as possible, pick my 2-3 favorite plants I harvested, and just use those seeds the next year. And call them all "Purple Sticky Punch- 1-2-3 and 4"

 

[johnny108]

I figured "Pa G.r.o.s." would be a stretch, maybe I should check to see what "One Sucker" is being grown in Lancaster by the local Amish farms. Thanks guys, I find everything to do with the seed names,or varieties totally confusing. It's like there are names associated by a particular grower than the next hand on that seed line strips it back to the Latin name, then the next hand on it will name the phenotype, then the next guy in line of dissent with the seed will strip it back to latin, a hundred times over until there is nothing identifiable, I just don't understand any of it.

And you haven’t even touched on the Oriental varieties, yet….Hungarian varieties named after cities in Turkey…

 

[Huffen'Snuff]

I can't wait till I have a few seasons under my belt, and have 1 or 2 favorite seeds picked out, maybe it would be more accurate to say a few seeds have chosen my gardens climate/region. The couple of leaves I got from bigbonner are just superb, maybe one day a couple plants will like me almost as much.
I have not even started to formulate curing questions yet, that shows just how green I am