by Francis Jock

Created on: July 30, 2010   Last Updated: May 03, 2012

There are many reasons for smokers, whether cigar, pipe, or cigarette, to grow tobacco at home nowadays. The high price of a pack of smokes is only one, other reasons include the pride you can feel from growing, harvesting and curing your own tobacco. When the time is right, you can enjoy your home-grown tobacco product in the privacy of your own home, secure in the knowledge that you haven't had to pay an extra penny for the pleasure.

You can grow tobacco in almost any environment, indoors or outdoors, as long as the light, temperature and humidity are suitable for the type of tobacco you are growing. Since there are several different kinds of tobacco plant, each with its own optimum growing conditions, the best advice is to spend time researching and selecting the right tobacco plant for you. Tobacco for cigarettes differs from tobacco best grown for cigars. The same is true for growing your own ceremonial tobacco, which isn't smoked, but rather savored for its uniqueness and spiritual powers, or burned for ceremonial or spiritual reasons.

Tobacco seeds are readily available from several different online resources and the price for a pack of fifty seeds is entirely reasonable, given the cost of a pack of cigarettes. Tobacco seeds can be started indoors in home made or commercial seed starter packages. Each seed will readily produce a single tobacco plant which can grow to considerable height. With the proper amount of light and moisture, tobacco plants will grow indoors in common indoor-gardening containers. Usually, however, young tobacco seedlings are transplanted to a sunny location with good soil and drainage. Once the seedlings are in the ground, after the danger of a late frost has passed, all you have to do is an occasional weeding and apply a little fertilizer, if needed.

Since the objective of growing your own tobacco plants means having the best tasting product, you should always remember to pamper the tobacco leaves. That means that fertilizers and chemicals are never applied directly to the plant as these will alter, and even destroy, the enjoyability of the product. Insecticides are not used. If insects become a problem, find a way to remove them without the direct application of any chemicals.

Tobacco plants are self-pollinating, but a reasonable amount of product requires planting several plants. The best spacing for transplanted tobacco plants is two-feet apart. This allows for plenty of light and air to circulate around the plant. It also gives

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