I never thought it would happen to me. How could it, these little troubl-makers only appeared in humidors that are not well-kept. The idea of having to either throw out all my cigars or freeze them and bring them back slowly in the humidor sounded absurd. NEVER! I said.
Well $hit, this morning was a slightly different story. I was about to sit down here at my desk and beging writing my final paper for MIS495; a cigar would complement the BS brain-storming session. I opened up the humi intent on grabbing one of the Hemmingway Classics (which had been spurred by the discussion above). As I waded through several leves of various sticks I came upon a Puros Indios Special Aged Piramide, I was about to push it aside when I noticed a rather odd color at the open end of the celo. I gingerly handled the cigar, inspecting the foot; specks of tobacco, looked quite a bit like ground pepper. Oh no. I know what this is an indication of.
Now I'm sure, there are/were definately cigar beetles rooting around in my humi; the implications are begining to set in. The money and time invested in these sticks, the hours of enjoyment that could have been, all to waste; damn. I suppose it's worth trying to find the culprits, see if they are still snacking on this stick or if they have moved to the row of Padron 1964 Aniversery Maduros directly below them. Low-and-behold: http://myweb.students.wwu.edu/~schnieb/stuff/cigars/beetles/beetles09.jpg http://myweb.students.wwu.edu/~schnieb/stuff/cigars/beetles/beetles10.jpg Just a few though, and they appear to be dead. I don't know how many beetles it takes to cause the carnage above. They could very possibly have moved somewhere else, better safe than sorry. Time to pull out all the cigars, inspect everyone of them and put them in the freezer for the next couple of weeks, in the mean time the humidor needs to be cleaned. An interesting morning to say the least.
nothings sadder to look at then a dissected cigar.
___
People aren't smoking cigars to be trendy, cool or stylish. They're smoking cigars because they like them. Because they enjoy the experience. Because for about $5 they can spend an hour sampling one of life's greatest luxuries. -David Savona
Posts: 1157 | Location: Ferndale, MI | Registered: October 03, 2004
OMG, I hate reading posts like these . Everytime this happens to someone it creeps me out. DD good luck with your smokes, hopefully it wasn't too big of a loss. Now I have to go inspect my smokes .
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Posts: 2499 | Location: SoCal, USA | Registered: March 06, 2004
Nothing like a cigar autopsy to make it hit home. I have yet to experience any beetles, but did have some mold once on the bunch of open sticks that were too close to my Cigar Oasis output. Luckily, they were Don Elias cigars from my brother (right into the garbage, where they belong anyway), and a couple of Partagas' that I didn't care to clean and try to resurrect). I moved any unwrapped sticks further away, and reduced by average humidity to 65%, temp is pretty constant at 69F. wiped down everything, cello or not, with no re-occurance since then. Still no bugs, though.
What have you been keeping the temp and RH at? Did you have any bouts of temperture rising above 70F?
Have you seen any others with the discoloration or holes yet? I assume that if there were no holes in the cello, they arrived with that particular Indios, and did not make their way out.
Posts: 818 | Location: Central New Jersey | Registered: March 15, 2005
After a short period of respect for your infested smokes, I am off once again to drag all of mine out for a full inspection.
"The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marines." Eleanor Roosevelt 1945
Posts: 711 | Location: Williamsburg, Va | Registered: June 16, 2003
Oh, DD, that is just a friggin' shame! I don't want to start an urban legend here, but I swear that I have heard of beetles associated with that brand before. Maybe I am wrong, hope so! Take care and good luck with the deforestation! Andy
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Posts: 1430 | Location: Miami, FL, USA | Registered: July 29, 2003
Aaaagh! Beetles! The mutant alien life form of the cigar world! Their spawn is spread upon healthy ligero leaves, where they await dormant until tempature and humidity conditions are right, when they escape from their capsules like those slimy creatures from the "Alien" movies, and then they infest God's most beautiful tobacco creations and devour and leave destruction in their wake. Then they move on and do it again! Oh, the humanity!
The risk of kicking butt is you get some crap on your shoe
Originally posted by sungunner: What have you been keeping the temp and RH at? Did you have any bouts of temperture rising above 70F?
Have you seen any others with the discoloration or holes yet? I assume that if there were no holes in the cello, they arrived with that particular Indios, and did not make their way out.
Since there is no such thing as an air conditioner here in northern Wa, if if gets hot outside I simply have to deal. The temps usually swing between 68 degree and 72 depending the day. They have been in the 68-70 lately but three weeks ago it got as hot as 76 degrees in here; I wonder if that is what woke them up. RH never gets above 70, usually around 68%.
Nothing noticeable on the other cigars, but I'm going to freeze them just to be sure. Thanks for the advice guys
Oh, would you all say a week in the freezer is long enough?
Originally posted by sungunner: What have you been keeping the temp and RH at? Did you have any bouts of temperture rising above 70F?
Have you seen any others with the discoloration or holes yet? I assume that if there were no holes in the cello, they arrived with that particular Indios, and did not make their way out.
Since there is no such thing as an air conditioner here in northern Wa, if if gets hot outside I simply have to deal. The temps usually swing between 68 degree and 72 depending the day. They have been in the 68-70 lately but three weeks ago it got as hot as 76 degrees in here; I wonder if that is what woke them up. RH never gets above 70, usually around 68%.
Nothing noticeable on the other cigars, but I'm going to freeze them just to be sure. Thanks for the advice guys
Oh, would you all say a week in the freezer is long enough?
I've actually heard that they don't need to freeze form more than a day or two, and then another day in the refridgerator to help them acclimate slowly. It seems odd that they would have hatched at such a low temp and humidity . My humidor is always under 70% RH but can easily get up to 75 or more degrees on hot days here and I have yet (knock on wood) to have beetle problems. Maybe your temp swing is what woke them up, I was just under the impression that they needed a little more heat that that. All the same, good luck DD and hopefully you were able to save some of those PAMs.
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Posts: 2499 | Location: SoCal, USA | Registered: March 06, 2004
DD, I feel so bad for you.... That just plain old SUCKS!
You should NEVER let your humidor temp rise above 70F. The humidity really does not play a factor in the beetles eggs, larve, pupa or adult cycle. But once the temp reaches above 70 for a given period of time, its all over...
Most people think its not going to happen to them. But in reality, everyone that has a decent size collection of cigars probably or does have dormant cigar beetle eggs in their humidor.
It is more common in lower end cigars. To cut costs, most of the cigars are not fumagated before they come to market. Or not stored properly, inspected or checked for contamination. That is why I don't buy house brands like T's anymore. There is a reason for them being so cheap...
Most major brands fumagate/treat their product some time during production process or a number of times to combat these litte creatures. Even some big name vendors like JR cigars fumagated all their products before resale and have fumagation trailers for just this reason. If they have a product in question, you just roll it into the fumagation trailers and nuke it.
Fumagation is the only pesticide that will penetrate the egg capsule, larve and pupa stages of the beetle.
My wife gets mad at me when we go on vacation. I will not turn the HVAC up or down to save on electricity while we are gone because of this reason. I keep my humidor in the basement because it always is below 70 degrees.
Good luck and I hope this helps. Love the pictures
"Don't take life so seriously, no matter what you do, you wont make it out alive."
Posts: 1257 | Location: On the greener side... | Registered: May 20, 2003
Awwww man, DD this story just kills me, I can imagine the sinking feeling in your heart as you dissected the first stoge. I have kept my humi's in my bedroom, now that it is spring it has gotten up to 74 or so a few times. After reading this I am moving them to the basement tonight. I suppose its better for them to be too cool than too hot.
Good luck with the stogies, the time they have to spend in the freezer depends on the freezer temp, the idea is to get the eggs frozen long enough to kill them. I saw a chart somewhere, maybe here or on CW. don't remember where though. Heck, BinDer probably knows having experienced the same issue recently. BinDer??
Argh! This got me thinking of the humidor I have in the garage...I was refinishing the top of it a few weeks ago, and kind of left it out there while the finish dried (I really just forgot about it)....I don't have a lot of empty humi room, so I just left the cigars in it, I just sanded & resealed the top because it looked kind of rough. Anyway, it's gotten up to the mid eighty's over the last week....ran into the garage, and sure enough.....beetles! (actually only found one, but he was alive and running around - and a lot bigger than I thought - but looks just like the ones in DD's pics) a small pile of what looked like black pepper under one smoke also.
Pulled all the smokes out and looked at them...no holes, and nothing coming out when I tapped the foot of the gars, but they all went into a zip-lock and into the freezer, and washed the inside of the 'dor out with alchohol.....I'll look the smokes over carefully after a few days in the freezer to see if I can spot the culprit...but I think it was from an FDO Corojo from a bundle that's been in there since last year (the rest were just some more FDO Corojos & Maddies, Padron Fumas and 3Ks, a couple of LGC #7s, and some odds-and ends, luckily, it's my smallest 'dor...so even if I have to pitch a few, no big loss....but these were just starting to smoke really well). I never had problems with beetles before, but this was the first time I had a humi that I let get over 70. It will definitely be the last time!!! (I feel like an idiot...should have known better...)
Thanks for posting this DD...it looks like I caught it early. I hope you get your's under control without too much damage to your smokes..
This message has been edited. Last edited by: rbihari,
"Stupidity cannot be cured with money, or through education, or by legislation." ~ Robert A. Heinlein (1907 - 1988)
The cigars have been in the freezer since yesterday afternoon and my humi has been cleaned out. I'll be leaving the cigars in the freezer until tomorrow afternoon, move them over to the fridge for a bit, then, to the humidor.
Residential freezers don't get cold enough. You need to kill the eggs:
1.Take all cigars out of boxes 2.Double or triple ziplock each bag of cigars, do the same for the boxes, get out as much air as possible 3.Freeze everything for 7 days 4.Clean out your humidor very well, and your humidification device, hygrometer, etc., no scraps of tobacco 5.After 7 days of freezing, 1 day in regular 'fridge 6.1 day at room temp 7.Put in humi and don't touch for a few months at least
Anything less than 7 days in freezer will not be adequate.
I would have to say that all those PAM 64s are infested with beetle larvae and need to be torched ASAP.
So to avoid a major outbreak yuu should start shipping them out imediatley.
Naturally being the good people that we are on this forum. I think we all would be willing to suffer along with you and smoke one or two of them for you.
Posts: 492 | Location: south of Boston | Registered: November 04, 2003
wow.... after reading about this travesty.... i bet we all checked our sticks.....ill have to pour out a lil beer for the fallen hommies.... this is a sad sad day.....i have nothing else to say
. Everytime this happens to someone it creeps me out. DD good luck with your smokes, hopefully it wasn't too big of a loss. Now I have to go inspect my smokes 
)
. My humidor is always under 70% RH but can easily get up to 75 or more degrees on hot days here and I have yet (knock on wood) to have beetle problems. Maybe your temp swing is what woke them up, I was just under the impression that they needed a little more heat that that. All the same, good luck DD and hopefully you were able to save some of those PAMs.
I will not turn the HVAC up or down to save on electricity while we are gone because of this reason. I keep my humidor in the basement because it always is below 70 degrees. 
