A useful exercise for refining one's priorities is to play "What if you only had one..."
- One Watt of power.
- One hank of baling twine.
- One bullet.
- One square-foot of growing space.
How would you use that extremely limited resource? In the case of power, you might decide that an smartphone that combines accurate time, communication, calculator functions and photos is the first, best-use of power. There are hundreds of millions (perhaps billions) of people in India and Africa that would agree with that.
The twine might go to snares.
The bullet for self-defense
The square-foot of growing space would likely go to "medicinal" plants or to "flavoring".
Community Gardens
I started a community garden a couple of decades ago. As is my custom, I over-analyzed the issue.
In inner-cities, a common community garden plot was about 30 square-feet. In cities (but not the most congested regions) it would be three times that size. In the suburbs, maybe 400 square-feet. In places where subsistence gardening is a way of life and not just a passing fad, 2000-to-4000 square-feet.
The 30 square-feet gardens tended to be very heavy on green, leafy flavoring herbs, hot peppers, garlic and green-onions. Likely, there would also be a cherry-tomato plant planted on the north side where it would not shade the shorter plants. Lots of bang-for-the-buck, or vitamins-per-square-foot in this case.
How does tobacco align with "medical" and "flavoring"?
Medicinal
Let us suppose that approximately 10% of the US population is under supervised, medical care for mental/emotional health issues at any given time. Furthermore, let us suppose that 30% of the population has been under supervised, medical care for mental/emotional health issues at some point in their lives.
What happens if the lights go out?
What happens if Seroquel, Abilify, Risperdone, Paxil, Lexipro and Adderal et al become unobtainium?
Tobacco is not a very "good" drug. It has side effects. It is addictive. It has carcinogenic chemicals in it.
On the plus side, if you can grow tomato plants you can grow tobacco. Patients are very good about "taking it". And it does help people "regulate" and to deal with stress and it is an appetite suppressant.
Little known factoid, "smoking" is a significant "self-medicating" symptom mental health professionals consider when diagnosing. People who are struggling are drawn to tobacco use because it is a comfort.
Insecticide
Nicotine is an insecticide with acceptable mammalian toxicity. If the lights went off, any loss of food production will really hurt. Even if you had the foresight to stockpile Carbaryl, Bifren and Permethrin, you will eventually run out, especially if you share it with your family, friends and neighbors...
How are you going to control head-lice* after you run out? How about potato beetles? Wireworms?
Tobacco to the rescue! Two tobacco plants can produce more seeds in one season than you and one-hundred of your closest friends will use in a lifetime. But first you have to have the seeds.
There is an astronomical amount of "leverage" in growing a small patch of tobacco.
Snoose
 |
| Rustica Limonka is a Nicotiana rustica strain that was bred/selected in Eastern Europe. |
Kubota enjoys using "Smokeless tobacco'.
He has given me permission to try to replicate his favorite brand of commercial "dip". 1.2 ounces of "Snoose" costs him $6.
Generic, moist dippin' tobacco has the following ingredients (by weight)
- Water
- Tobacco (not even the first ingredient so less than 50% by weight!!!)
- Salt (hygroscopic, flavor)
- Natural and Artificial Flavors (Peppermint Schnapps, for instance)
- Ethyl Alcohol (Peppermint Schnaps)
- Propylene Glycol (slows drying, increases shelf-life. Typically 2%)
- Sodium Carbonate (pH buffer to slow nicotine solubility. Baking soda is an acceptable substitute)
Given a price of $20/pound for cured, Burley tobacco and 27 "cans" of finished snoose per pound, that works out to a retail value of $160 for an 700% mark-up.
If I GREW the tobacco, then it is almost free. Nicotiana rustica tends to run higher in nicotine than N. tobaccum species and does not require a long growing season. So, N. rustica it is. And if I let the two best growing individual plants go to seed, then I will have plenty to share.
Many years ago, I'm guessing 18 to 20, I tried growing some tobacco here in the UP. No idea what variety. It grew up tall and heathy but didn't set seed. So if I can grow it here you can probably grow it most places, but might have to stock up on seed. I'll try again this spring. Any variety suggestions? --ken
ReplyDeletehttps://victoryseeds.com/products/limonka-rustica-lemon
Deleteor
https://victoryseeds.com/products/hasankeyf-tobacco
or
https://victoryseeds.com/products/mohawk-tobacco
Thanks. I'll get some ordered. -ken
DeleteGrowing tobacco tends to deplete soil quality. My late great uncle grew it as a cash crop and had to rotate crops and use fertilizer because it depleted soil returning nothing to the ground.
ReplyDeleteInteresting set of choices, and it would also depend on location, location, location.
ReplyDeleteSome details on controlling lice with tobacco please.
ReplyDeleteTobacco juice has been used for head lice for literally hundreds of years. http://www.thebestcontrol.com/bugstop/control_lice.htm
ReplyDeleteIt isn't the best remedy, but is better than nothing.
Copy and paste gives me nothing about tobacco friend. Just bulk google about best store bought lice control.
DeleteHelp?
I had a friend who had a very short-term, intimate relationship with a woman and found himself with "livestock"
DeleteEven the best, modern synthetic insecticides (acaricides?) were not able to eradicate them.
His doctor told him to shave "down there" and liberally apply olive oil to smother the little crustaceans. That worked.
There is a pretty good chance that the custom of "greasing" hair started as a control for lice. Mayonnaise also works.
So I am going to dodge the task of trying to find a home-craft friendly, effective method of extracting and formulating nicotine-based materials for use on human bodies and suggest that lard or vegetable oil be used.
Or, if the patient with head-lice is a young single woman, bacon grease is the essential oil of choice. She can trade-up, head-lice for a boy-friend who likes the way she smells.
Shaving, washing well and greasing to smother the little critters works. I know some folklore of eating a cigarette or two a day for a few days to clear intestinal worms.
DeleteThe pertinent sentence in my link was: 'Nicholas Culpeper in his 1681 The English Physician Enlarged recommended tobacco juice to kill lice on children's heads, a very early reference to the use of tobacco as an insecticide poison.' Modern testing shows that a fair amount of lice survive the tobacco juice treatment, although it does make it easier to comb the survivors out.
DeleteAs ER Joe notes, lice are best dealt with by shaving off all hair, applying oil or grease and disinfecting or throwing away bedding, clothing, etc..
Only in the era of cheap Chinese bedding/clothing can we toss them. Shakespeare famously put in his will that so and so would get his 2nd best bed.
DeleteBoiling was a common way to wash clothing pre-electricity. Sunlight and fresh air was a smart housewife's spring cleaning.
Did a very decent job cleaning clothing even without soap as soap wasn't cheap back then also.
Tobacco juice is indeed a decent insecticide. But the effective level is a tad toxic to children. Don't use it on Nightshade vegetables as tobacco is a nightshade and that often spreads diseases.
ATF generally frowns on private growers off grid. Be careful…
ReplyDeleteMany states have changed their laws recently to allow for small scale personal use tobacco growing. In many cases they mirror marijuana laws.
DeleteJonathan
Not a user but one more example of why ATF needs to go. As they say, ATF should be the name of a store.
DeleteAn interesting idea, as you mention less efficient but more doable on a small scale.
ReplyDeleteJonathan
Milk & nicotine. A gallon of whole milk a day on average. 30+ years of dipping. Non flavored, Straight, not Copenhagen. The flavored ones cause heart burn, and seem to degrade skin surface. I've always said It kept me from blowing my brains out, or choking the living *hit out of others, thereby avoiding prison! If you're dipping, you're not eating, weight control. Tend to swallow, not spit, so unless accidentally spit on, no second hand smoke. My brand just went to $4.75.
ReplyDelete61 today, with no health issues or prescriptions. Though I wouldn't be surprised to (hopefully) drop dead of a heart attack. Please Lord kill me quick, as I wouldn't want to have to be cared for from a stroke or mild heart attack by people I'd be inclined to want to choke the living *hit out of, but couldn't!!!
Now do poppy's. LOL!
ReplyDelete