ever had a beetle infestation ???

[dvickery]

we have all gotten cigars with bore holes ... doesnt count ... what i would like to know is ... have you had beetles damage your cigars ... after you bought them .

jf your answer is ... yes .

secondary question (you need not answer ) ... do you now freeze your cigars ... yes or no .

final note : this is not a "do you freeze your cigars " thread for the masses (lord knows we have all read enough of these ) . the only people i want to here answer this question are those (like myself) who have seen the little horrors live .

thanks all
derrek

[icehog3]

Is this a recent happening, Derrek?

[shilala]

I had a beetle-drilled cigar once. It was a Cusano 18 paired maduro (or something like that) that I ordered with some stuff I got from a shop in AZ.
Seems to me I may have gotten another one along the way, but I can't remember.
So that's the size of my infestation. I've just gone ahead and decided to live with it. I've never frozen a cigar in my life, unless you count the ones I smoked while I was shoveling snow.

[mosesbotbol]

Yes I have had them and I did start freezing cigars, but do not do so any more. I have a cabinet now instead of a desktop and keeping cigars in their box mitigates some of the widespread damage. Make sure to not get your environment too humid or hot as both will hatch the beetles.

[markem]

I had one case of known beetle activity after they arrived in my humidor from CCs (several from NCs but in the long distant past). When you catch the little bugger in the act, it's a big hint.

If I am buying cigars that are not more than 2 years old (an arbitrary number), then I freeze. Old stock I do not freeze because I worry about potential wrapper damage and figure if they haven't eaten these sticks yet ...

My humidors get to 80* and sometimes above during the summer. I've not had a breakout in years and never from a box that I froze.

Knowing my luck, guess what I'll find when I get back from vacation :)

[pektel]

***slowly backs out of thread***

[mosesbotbol]

If I am buying cigars that are not more than 2 years old (an arbitrary number), then I freeze. Old stock I do not freeze because I worry about potential wrapper damage and figure if they haven't eaten these sticks yet ...


They can stay dormant for years from what I read.

[galaga]

About a decade ago I was smoking a Partagas Lusi on a warm summer day with a loose draw. As time went by, the draw got easier. After about a third way through I took the band off to find a larva squirming around under the band had make a gash in the cigar slightly larger than itself, maybe 0.5 x 1.25 cm. Got rid of his ass and if I covered up the hole, the cigar smoked fine and so I did. Looking in the bottom of the cooler I found evidence of an infestation so I put a towel over the top of the cigars for insulation and then covered the towels with dry ice and shut the cooler up for 24 hours. Don't remember what the temperature got down to, but those cigars were fine afterwards. I have never frozen cigars since.

[markem]

They can stay dormant for years from what I read.

Of course. I was merely stating a boundary below which I will definitely freeze. I typically freeze anything from a vendor or private party for whom I do not know the details of their storage.

[T.G]

Once that I can recall, although it might have been twice.

The one that made the difference for me... I'm not really sure it was an infestation, I think it might have been a single beetle. Someone gave me an NC, can't recall the brand anymore other than it was something I had never had before nor since. Anyway, it was fine when they gave it to me. I put in a humidor and a few months later, I pulled it out and it had a hole or two and it was obvious where the beetle had eaten the wrapper leaf up the side of the cigar.

Never found the beetle and couldn't find any evidence of any other cigars being munched on, but I froze everything, vacuumed the humidor and all the boxes, all that crap.

Been freezing all incoming cigars ever since.

[czerbe]

I had a small break out ruined one or two of my cigars but I caught all three of those buggers the found a hot death. I don't freeze my cigars never have and not sure I ever will. I have heard plenty of great stories of people freezing their sticks just not something I'm going to do.

[dvickery]

Is this a recent happening, Derrek?

tom

no not recent ... 2002 and 2005 .

2002 ... in one of my coolers(got to see them live and moving) ... lost a few monty#4's a few fonseca cosacos and a few boli cg's .

2005 ... returned from cuba ... box purchases were okay ... a plastic baggie with 4 or 5 singles were good when i put them in there ... when i got home a few had bore holes ... didnt see anything alive but it is hard to ignore that kind of evidence .

just trying to think of a thread to post ... that hasnt been asked a thousand times before :) .

derrek

[OnePyroTec]

In the late 90's I had a bunch of Vintage RyJ's from the old Holco Rohr days that got hot one summer and several little buggers hatched. They were contained in a certain small cooler but to be safe everything went into the freezer.

That was a learning lesson on storage & temps. Since then I have not put too many cigars in the freezer and I haven't had very many more hatching incidents. Just an isolated bugger now and then. EVERYTHING I buy in the warmer months goes into a quarantine period before I migrate to the rest of my storage.

[php007]

Yes, lost 2 boxes of Boli Gold Medals and some OR Mag 50's. I Freeze everything now.

[E.J.]

Never had beetles

Don't freeze

[Wharf Rat]

Yes, I had beetles show up in some cigars I bought from a little shop in Ybor City. I freeze everything now.

[Ashcan Bill]

Hey Derrek! I've had one cigar that was damaged after I took possession. A Pepin Blue if I recall. A couple of others I'm not sure about, both Cuban. One I strongly suspect took at least partial damage after I received it, the other probably got munched on before but made me suspicious.

Each case was limited to one cigar, so I've never experienced what I'd consider an infestation. The Pepin had a beetle going to town on it, one Cuban I think had a beetle as well (that one was a while back and my memory may be faulty) and the third if I remember correctly had damage and larva in it.

No, I don't nor have I ever frozen a cigar.

[Weelok]

I have had a beetle outbreak but caught it early and only lost three cigars. I didn't see the beetle thought but I isolated the box until I felt safe.

I don't freeze cigars but I do keep my cigars in a cooler set to 60 degrees F. No problems in last five years. Coolers for the win.

[irratebass]

Derrick, you can read my story here http://www.cigarasylum.com/vb/showthread.php?t=49721 Starts on #18 with pics.

To answer your question, if I order online or receive sticks from someone I don't know that well......yep I freeze them.

[mravery]

Glad I found this thread as searches for recent posts in other sites came up dry.

I was wondering if the manufacturing and handling of the tobacco and cigars had changed since the early 2000's as that is where most of the 'beetle' threads date.

Just picked up a large cabinet humi and didn't know if I should start freezing. I keep the humidity fairly low (66rH) but the problem with Florida is that the temperature is tied to the A/C. So it ranges from 71 at night to 81 during the day.

Will those little bastards hatch in the 66rH range with a high temp or would that keep them under control?

Also, does anyone know if the big web retailers have any sort of special handling in their processes to ensure no infestations?

I really didn't want to start freezing (wife has issues with cigars and putting them in the freezer would add to the list :sl ) but if it is still an issue I may have to.

[Wharf Rat]

Also, does anyone know if the big web retailers have any sort of special handling in their processes to ensure no infestations?



I toured JR's warehouse once. They said that they relied on their trusted suppliers to deliver cigars that were beetle free. They have a freezer that they use on shipments that might be suspect, for example, if they bought out someone else's stock.

Your best bet is to learn to love to freeze.

[sigsauer]

i once had a opus perfection x (cedar sleeve) that I kept forever in a single plastic bag....I finally decided to smoke it......when I removed the cedar sleeve.....the cigar looked like swiss cheese.......weird no beetles in bag....maybe they suffocated?

[T.G]

Will those little bastards hatch in the 66rH range with a high temp or would that keep them under control?


Incubation is mostly dependent on temperatures. They will incubate and hatch in considerably lower ambient humidity than where you are presently keeping your humidor.

[Weelok]

I'd have to look up the chart again but here is some of the data I found when a Graycliff hatched in my humidor.

1. Most cigar manufacturers have two things they use to control beetles, one is pesticides in the warehouse (fumigants), and the other is freezing after the cigar is rolled.

2. Freezing can actually destroy the beetle eggs and optimally a "deep freeze" such as used to flash freeze fish is recommended.

3. High temperatures (spiru.cgahr.ksu.edu/proj/iwcspp/pdf2/9/6239.pdf) destroy beetle eggs as well and is actually more commonly used in the food industry to control them as it's really not all that hot and grains etc don't mind it at all. At 55 degrees C for roughly an hour all of the eggs are destroyed. With regards to heating cigars though, not very common and I'm guessing it's due to the same thing as fish, e.g. flash freezing fish keeps them fresh and tasty and heating them up, well, cooks them.

4. If the cigars are not fumigated, deep frozen, or heat treated, there is almost a 100% chance that beetle eggs are dormant inside of the cigar and then it's a game of when they hatch.

5. Hatching is mostly temperature dependent because you don't want to have a grain dry and dusty cigar so your stuck with being in an optimal humidity range. The optimal temperature range is 80 degrees F however the range is from 60 degrees F to 110 degrees F for hatching with lower temperatures increasing the time in dormancy. At 80 degrees F incubation time of less then a week to hatching. Even storing cigars at 65 deg F and 65% humidity hatches beetles. You have to store below 60 deg F if you want to prevent them from hatching if the eggs are present.

Well, that is what I remembered and I did browse the internet before posting this reading all sorts of conclusions in University studies as the details, well, ADD kicks in and I just can't read the biology test details.

[sweater914]

I'm doing a salt test on my hygrometer over the last couple of days in the basement. Upstairs it's between 68-70 degrees and downstairs according to the hygrometer sits between 65-66 degrees.

If that temperature spread holds during the summer, the house sits at 80-81 degrees during a couple of weeks in the summer. I'd be near the upper edge of the recommended temperature spread.

That being said I'll probably freeze my cigars, once I get my bloody cooler, time and money, time and money.

[Weelok]

You can also heat the cigars as I said. Think bed bugs and how to kill them which is wrap in plastic, heat up to about 120 degrees F, sit for an hour and they are all dead. A lot of people resist heating cigars since they can burst and crack the wrappers from swelling but I think you can try that as well. Not much forum approaches discuss heating cigars so you'll be on a fringe but then again, 8 years ago freezing cigars was quite a controversy and I would submit many even on this forum are opposed to freezing cigars.

For the most part manufactures have gotten much better and when my Graycliff hatched it was a fairly common problem for Graycliff at the time. I've seen Cohiba's have beetle holes in them as well, the Dominican Cohiba's that is and it was a few years before my Graycliff.

[CigarNut]

The freezing process is well understood; there are things you can do to prevent your cigars from dehydrating during freezing, thereby preserving the RH of the cigars.

Your cigars would also require some sort of protection to keep from drying out in the oven -- even for an hour and it's not like you can use your five-finger bags or any poly wrap to protect them. Not to mention a whole lot of other potential problems...

If you are worried about beetles I would stick to using the freezer... Just my :2 (and maybe not even worth that much :))

[markem]

Very interesting information, Dave. It would be very educational to find a write-up from a cigar smoker who used the heat technique. It seems to me, off hand, that the precautions and setup for the heating would be more involved and stringent than freezing. However, knowing alternate methods is always a plus.

Personally, I'd be very worried about damaging the oils in the tobacco and so am unlikely to experiment with this technique. On the other hand, when I smoke a cigar, the temps get above 140*, so I'm pretty sure that the eggs are toast (pun) anyway

[shilala]

Mark, for some reason I'm thinking volatile oils need about 375*F.
I'm thinking those Sea cans that come in with cigars probably get pretty hot in the Carribean sun, and smokes don't seem to suffer?
Obviously the containers that are buried in the pile on probably don't get all that hot on the ship, but closed up and sitting in the shipyard they have to get pretty damned toasty.
Just thinking is all. :)

[JJKJR]

I most certainly had a beetle infestation. Be sure when you clean your humidor you pay close attension to whatever you use to humidify your sticks. After the first cleaning, I didn't clean out my Boveda Pack and the beetles returned. They love the moisture of the packs. The second cleaning cleared them out for good. I now always freeze any and I mean any cigars I get.

[T.G]

Mark, for some reason I'm thinking volatile oils need about 375*F.
I'm thinking those Sea cans that come in with cigars probably get pretty hot in the Carribean sun, and smokes don't seem to suffer?
Obviously the containers that are buried in the pile on probably don't get all that hot on the ship, but closed up and sitting in the shipyard they have to get pretty damned toasty.
Just thinking is all. :)

Yeah, but depending on the origin, those cigars might or might not be cello wrapped, then packed in boxes (some of which are near airtight) or mazos, then possibly shrink wrapped depending on origin, and finally packed into larger boxes. Some NC manufacturers are also known for pumping up the humidity in the cigars prior to transport. I'm not sure if Cuba engages in shipping cigars are higher humidity or not - although I believe their humidity tends to be high, so it kind of happens on it's own.

That's a lot of layers of protection to drying out or damaging the oils that you won't have if those cigars go in the oven. I also question the 120F for 1 hour as I'm sure that lots of cigars see those kind of temps for longer in transit, yet we still hear of beetle outbreaks.

I see putting cigars in the oven as being kind of like baking a cake in your dishwasher. You can do it, but it's really ****ing retarded.

[baust55]

No infestations ...............but I freeze all of my cigars 72 HRS when I get them before they go in the WineAdor .

Plenty of threads on how to do that.

[markem]

Mark, for some reason I'm thinking volatile oils need about 375*F.
I'm thinking those Sea cans that come in with cigars probably get pretty hot in the Carribean sun, and smokes don't seem to suffer?
Obviously the containers that are buried in the pile on probably don't get all that hot on the ship, but closed up and sitting in the shipyard they have to get pretty damned toasty.
Just thinking is all. :)

Good point, Scott. I was mostly thinking of drying out the cigars but you are quite correct that the referenced technique is much lower in temp that ambient in many cases. In looking at the referenced PDF, I see that the temps are quite low (below 125F). That doesn't seem very high for the possible benefit. Of course, some also use their microwave to reduce the humidity in their cigars (right man's dry box?), if I recall correctly (may have been a post way back at CS).

[Weelok]

I was a bit hasty in some of my numbers as I didn't really think heating cigars would be interesting but in retrospect it is certainly discussion,worthy. So the paper states 50 degrees C (122 deg F) for 12 hours kills all tobacco beetle eggs. This test was confirmed in both plastic and glass dishes in both an oven and an environmental chamber.

I am assuming the environmental chamber is calibrated and has a circulatory fan so is probably more accurate.

I would agree that many cigars are stored or shipped at these temperatures but I also submit that beetle hatching is not very common and most people never experience the horror of well fed beetles living on premium cigars. I guess in general it seems simpler to bake cigars at 122 in a plastic Tupperware container with a damp sponge for 12 hours but I am not sure my home oven even goes that low and work might frown on me using our large environmental chamber to heat my cigars. I also submit that most people will go their whole lives smoking aged cigars and never see a beetle.

In the end I am just happy Universities consider tobacco preservation something worthy to study as so many schools are trying to figure out how to get rid of tobacco.

[Weelok]

Here is another article on how to kill bed bugs which are probably similar nasty critters to kill.

http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=2&sqi=2&ved=0CEMQFjAB&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.vdacs.virginia.gov%2Fpesticid es%2Fpdffiles%2Fbb-heat1.pdf&ei=uz4-VKyOKoORuATb3YKQDw&usg=AFQjCNHvAqjY47RwLCRrjPJ2j_T2QSj-SA&sig2=eUuFWG-qshoZVjAjza-Y0A&bvm=bv.77412846,d.c2E

Conclusion:

Recent research has determined the thermal death points (the temperature at which a bed bug dies) for bed bugs and their eggs. The thermal death point is determined by two things; temperature, and exposure time. Bed bugs ex- posed to 113°F will die if they receive constant exposure to that temperature for 90 minutes or more. However, they will die within 20 minutes if exposed to 118°F. Interestingly, bed bug eggs must be exposed to 118°F for 90 minutes to reach 100% mortality. Note that whole room heat treatments (see below) are based on a thermal death point of 113°F, yet these treatments have been very successful. This is due to the use of powerful fans to create convection currents within the heated room. These currents heat the bed bugs very rapidly, thus increasing their mortality.

[shark]

I've had a couple of ones that arrived with holes in them. I just took pics of them for the vendor and they made it right.


Could you imagine this? This pic has been around for a long time:

http://www.megalomaniac.com/~andrew/cigars/buggy_pams.jpg

[cigarmarine]

does freezing have any effect on the cigar

[jjirons69]

I've had two of the little bastards all the way back to '05. They were caught before they could spread the damage. For the past several years I've put all cigars in the deep freezer for min. 72 hours before settling down to rest - this includes all internet, local, and gifts. Never any damage from freezing and no more bugs. However, I do have a buddy that swears he has had a bug after freezing protocols. I can't say either way, but I doubted his claim when he told me. He has a ton of loose sticks and he's no where near as organized as me. Ha!

[trogdor]

I had an infestation years ago when the extent of my inventory was a desktop humidor. A recent addition had a hatch out, and they were all over the place in there. Luckily everything was still smokable, although there were quite a few with holes.
Ever since then, everything I get goes in the freezer for a few days, and I have had no more problems.

[markem]

Here is a story of an epic beatle invasion from years ago. It's still being talked about.

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/pictures/how-the-beatles-took-america-photos-of-the-historic-1964-invasion-20140128

[shilala]

I have absolutely zero proof of this, except for my experience with beetle larvae among troop smokes that have passed through here.
They'll go right through cello.
I have never, not once, seen them drill through a finger bag. That's despite seeing a number of drilled smokes in finger bags that have eaten uncelloed smokes and celloed smokes alike.
(My guess is that they'll eat cellophane because it is made of plant material and will not eat finger bags because they are pvc or petroleum based? I'm really not sure what finger bags are made of.)

I use tons of single finger bags for all those smokes I gather up here and there. I use them in my travel humidors and drawers.
I don't put all my smokes in them, by any means, but I feel it's good practice, and could stop a problem if it ever did happen to arise.
It's something to talk on that goes to storage, and if there's truly anything to it, it's another way to protect smokes.

Maybe Adam and Hugh can weigh in on this. They're also seen gazillions of cigars go through their hands and may have witnessed what I mention.