After poking around a bit on the forum the past two years, I
have noticed that - as you can tell with my last posts - there is not much on
the traditional cultivation of French-Canadian tobacco. The art is nigh dead or
in its death throes, and I hope that I can pick the brains of some of the
old-timers here and there to bring the tradition back. However, although pipe
smoking was the norm, I’d like to take it back to early 19th
century snuff taking. Anyhow, this video features a man who lives not
far from where I do, though I have no contact information, nor do I
know if he is still living as he seems rather unhealthy. The video is in
an old-timer French dialect, closer to Magoua than Joual (imo) and
he goes on about how he does things like his father showed him, so
traditionally (big plus). the tobacco is not fermented, which seems to have
been a staple of the “tabac canadien” described elsewhere as having
an off-putting sour taste (likely the ammonias, etc.) the leaves seem to
be, to my knowledge close to a Havana or Havana/Burley hybrid or maybe it is Virginia… someone with more experience there will let me know. The
seeds used here were heirlooms… WHICH IS WHY I MUST GET SOME!!! He hands the
tobacco from September to November, November being rather bitterly cold
here and then he makes a twist of it. He sais that he used to sell it to his
uncles when he was a kid and that they would take the twist, leave it in their
pocket as they would split wood or farm and then cut a “bourre”
off of it for their pipes.
I’d offer a transcription in English, but it’s rather what I have said above.
He also goes on about how his tobacco is “light” as in weight, but he seems to also be confounding “light” flavours… stating that his tobacco is light and devoid of poison and chemicals… yeah, yeah I know but this is old-timer folk knowledge, he could have said pixies sprinkle magic tobacco dust on his leaves and *I* would be inclined to take him at his word.
In the article I posted earlier in the Library it goes on about how old-time F-Cs didn’t trust American tobacco, only that which was grown by farmers as a personal crop that they would share or sell for some extra cash. He, like most F-C old-timers, such as my deceased Grandfather, believed (and rightly so) that industrial manufactured tobacco was loaded with noxious poisons… because it came pre-packaged. My grandfather picked his own for many years throughout the Quebec tobacco belt.
Tracking him down… further info (FR)
http://irepi.ulaval.ca/fiche-culture-artisanale-tabac-dans-outaouais-909.html