Yet another MOLDY question...

[hot4stogies]

Hi all,

Been a while! Have been swamped. Glad to be back.

My story. I ordered some cheap-o seconds a while back and when I got them I thought they looked a little "dusty" like they had been around a while and they were very bundle pressed. I thought they probably were OK so I put them in seperate cedar boxes and placed them in my coolerdor. I was in the process of aging them and after 6 months I took a peek...MOLD. It was in early stages and was not inside the wrappers and looked the same in each cedar box with these cigars. I tossed all the molded cigars. None of my other cedar boxes in the coolerdor nor their cigars show signs of mold so I am quite certain that this stuff was in the cigars when I got them. My RH never goes over 73 and I air this coolerdor out at least twice a month.

My questions: Should I worry about the other cigs in the coolerdor? Can I save these two cedar boxes (they are really cool ones)? So far I have wiped them with alcohol, dried and put them in the freezer for 2 days in a plastic bag.

Just how pervasive is this mold?

Thanks guys.

[sgoselin]

I cannot claim to be an expert on mold on cigars, however I am an expert on mold in general. My business is investigating and cleaning up moldy buildings. Applying those principles we know that mold is ubiquitious in the environment, it is everywhere. Elevated levels occur for only one reason, excessive moisture or high relative humidity. However, once levels have become elevated even slightly high levels of RH will foster further growth. As an example when sheetrock gets wet and is not dried down quickly enough visible mold growth will appear. If the moisture source is eliminated, but the RH is above 65% - 70% the mold will continue to proliferate. This supports the theory that elevated levels of mold were already present on that particular batch of cigars. However, the contaminated cigars do not pose a threat to the rest of your cigars. Since mold is ubiquitious it is already present on all of your cigars and it would require direct wetting or high RH to become elevated. I would suggest keeping the RH under 70% if you are concerned. I also do not think that it was necessary to freeze or alcohol wipe or dispose of any cigars. I once went on a trip and my coolador spiked up into the 80% range. All of my cigars had visible mold growth. I took a small soft brush and simply brushed them off and got the RH down to 65%. Neither alcohol nor freezing will kill all of the mold, controlling moisture and RH is the only way long term. I guess if these particular cigars continue to be a problem then you should just trash them as that would be an indicator that the mold is not simply surface growth, but is deep into the matrix of the material (tobacco). Good luck.

[hot4stogies]

Man! Now this is super information. I really appreciate the advice and I now feel much more at ease about my remaining cigars. I will try to keep the RH at 70% or less with no exceptions. I will also post an update to this situation as I am convinced that mold can now happen to anyone considering I am very careful with my storage environment yet I got bit.

ClubStogie rocks. Thanks a million sgoselin.

[kllrwlf]

Thanks SGOSELIN for that excellant informative information! :)

[Ryan]

Honestly I never thought I'd learn so much about mold...thanks for the info

Ryan

http://homepage.mac.com/sheerin/ryansigtag.jpg

[filly]