I have been kindly sent some Mapacho seeds from a friend (thank you!) and i was hoping to plant them today.
I thought about how many Nexus members love Mapacho and so i thought id ask about growing it.
Do you folks grow this plant? Can it be grown indoors? Does anyone have any good solid growth parameters?

Im going to try three seeds, wish me luck! The Mapacho will be grown alongside a few other herbs and what not. Hopefully it will help to keep the beastys away!

Collected info:

http://myfolia.com/zones/8b
http://www.plot55.com/growing/nicotiana.html

When you harvest rustica and cure the leaves, boil leaves down to a thick paste and dip cured leaves in this paste and let dry. THAT is mapacho. Cured leaves are just n. rustica.
It's a very easy and beautiful plant to grow. It likes sunshine and shade. Never tried in doors but I'm sure if you moved it around outside to inside often it would be very happy.
Seedlings are a little weak so you may have to prop up with toothpicks, otherwise, just water and let the plant machine do it's thing 'til harvest season.

When that comes around, gather leaves and put in pile. Move them around every couple of days until they are all yellow. Next, hang them up to dry. I let mine hang a couple months, but you can wait as long as you'd like. Very smooth, divine, smoke. Cheers, xtech

Awsome response. Thanks.
I planted about 5 seeds in the end. In some plastic cups topped with film and sat in Gin glasses, that way i can water from below.
Looking forward to watching this grow.

i need to get some tobacco going..I dont like to buy any commerical tobacco at all its all poison..but i like real tobacco with ayahuasca.

Im glad people here are into mapacho..it can be a great medicine..tobacco is great for toothaches as well..its helped me at times when i was grinding the hell out of my jaw.

I grew one to flower once indoors under fluorescents and got seeds it wasn't that potent, but it was root bound on purpose since I didn't want a huge plant. I didn't try the resin trick sounds good how many leaves do you boil and what size though? They're pretty easy to grow, they love nitrogen so give them some manure tea ,or some nitrogen rich fertilizer every once in a while.

I've heard native americans didn't even cure their leaves, I imagine they just dried some by a fire and then smoked it or something.
As for the thick paste, maybe a hand full or less and boil it down. Something you just kind of consciously improvise.
I've seen some amazonian shamans blast this paste up their nose...like a super concentrated singado...I highly do not recommend that!

Do they survive winter? I mean if you dont torture the poor plant by taking off its leaves for harvesting, then would it become annual?

By the way, they just started to poke their heads up.
Ill get some pictures later on when they are a little bit more visable.

Anyone else growing some Mapacho this season?

just about to plant some

I love N. Rustica.. this is going to be my third year growing.

I always have almost 100% germ with these "tiny" seeds lol.
they have a soft root system (expecially when young) so start them off in a well aerated not very dense soil. practical seed starting mix works great, it is what I have always used....just dont pack it down.

they start taking off rather slow then after the second month they blow up (at least for me).
they like lots of light with warm/hot conditions as long as they get some time to sleep as well.
the t5's work good for indoors but it's best to use sun when they get bigger.

after about a month I transplant them to pots where I use well composted soil with humice lots of perlite and sand, to this I also add ash from burnt cedar or oak for nitrogen. Tobacco from my experience eats up nutes faster then any plant I have ever worked with.. I like to give it quite abit of nitrogen and potash during it's vigerous growth but I stop a month before I harvest. Tobacco is "known" to completly deplete soil for all of it's nutes.

for watering it's best to completly soak then wait until it's completly dry agiain to water.
a trick I use is to put some rocks in the bottom of my pot (little larger then the holes) to help with draining.

If started in spring you should be able to go from seed to full grown 3-4' in about 90-100 days.

Good Luck!

I could use alittle help in the curing harvesting department how ever.....any tips?
last time I dried it all out in about 2 weeks, this was 2 fast and it was really harsh..however potent.

Careful smoking that stuff. It is POTENT tobacco. I've gotten a bad case of nicotine poisening from 1 cigarette.

What I do is wait for the plant to start to yellow, then I harvest the leaves.
I put them in a pile and every 2 days or so I move them around so they don't mold.
This is kind of like fermentation and it makes them yellow.
I take the yellow ones and I hang them in a cupboard until they have dried. This took a month at least last time.
Results were a VERY SMOOTH and divine consciousness amplifier. BLISS!

Well they are growing steadily.
I must have dropped more then one seed into one of the pots because it has 4 seedlings in it! I wonder how those ones will do.

Can you bush these out by topping or anything?
Its so exciting watching them get a little bigger each day!

From here.

Looks like i best transfer them to bigger pots right away!
Ill do that tommorow then. Pics to follow.

Xtechre

I am highly impressed, your Nicotiana Rustica plant looks really beautiful and oh so happy.
Nice one, thank you so much for sharing.


Much Peace and Understanding

xtech that looks like a very healthy and happy plant man ... props!

I just went and bought some in a log, but theres something satisfying about growing and caring for a plant from seed. Maybe too late for me to start some this year, but defo next.

Peace!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicotiana_rustica
Other reasons for its shamanic use are the comparatively high levels of MAOI beta-carbolines, including harmine, harmaline and tetrahydroharmine
I do wonder what smoking dmt on top of rustica tobacco would be like .. might be pretty similar to changa?

^ Anyone ever tried making this into enhanced leaf?

Also, could one roll a blunt with one of the leaves if dried properly?

Shouldn't be a problem. Due to the degree of harshness that I have read about though, it would be recommended to incorporate some moroccan mint or peppermint as well as some mullein to help smooth it out.

I am very interested in growing this species as well! I'll see if I can get my hands on some seeds or cuttings.