How Do I Humidify?

While I am a cigar sommelier on the side, my main gig is as an IT Professional, primarily (lately) as a technical trainer. Of course, since 2020 all but one of my classes have been taught remotely from the comfort of my living room/office. I feel that I am inviting my students into my home, and that has both upsides and downsides. One of the upsides is that it forces me to keep my apartment neat and tidy, which has not always been my strong suit. It also allows me to introduce my students to Her Royal Floofness, Princess Sophie. Many of my students are always happy to meet her on camera, and some will even bring their fur-babies onto cam to see us.

I was teaching a class about the proper environmental conditions to maintain computers at, including temperature and humidity levels. One of my students asked how they could tell what the humidity in their office was without spending too much money. I turned my camera around, walked over to open my humidor, and pulled out a hygrometer which displays both the humidity and temperature. I told them that the device cost about $12 on Amazon.

Later one of my students asked about how I maintain the humidity in my cabinet humidor.

I was wondering your preferred method of seasoning a humidor. as well, how do you prefer to keep humidity in the humidor. Do you prefer Boveda packs? Do you use distilled water?I noticed your AMAZING humidor in the background and was wondering how you keep the humidity on target. Also, I’m #envious.

Okay, so let’s answer.

Seasoning

When I get a new humidor I like to season it by using a very clean cloth and distilled water. I know, there are Boveda packs available to season humidors, but I am old fashioned like that. I will wet all of the wooden areas down with the distilled water, and I will let it season for a few days until the proper humidity is achieved. On occasion I have had to season a humidor a couple of times, especially if it was an older one that had been really dried out.

Humidification

The humidification method for a humidor has to depend on its size, as well as the number of cigars that are being maintained. For most smaller humidors (capacity to ~100 cigars) I am happy to use a passive humidification system. These could include humidification beads soaked with distilled (always distilled) water. You can also use Boveda packs which are less maintenance, but do require replacement every so often. There are people who reanimate dried-out humidification packs; I think my cigars are too precious to me to cheap out on that.

For my large humidor (6’ tall, capacity in excess of 1000 cigars) I use an active humidification system that is a reservoir for humidification beads and distilled water with fans that circulate the humidity throughout the cabinet. There is a digital sensor for the system that attaches by a long ribbon cable, so while the system sits on the bottom shelf of the humidor, the display is at eye level at the top. It is also Bluetooth enabled and is connected to an app on my smartphone, so when the humidity or temperature falls out of my accepted norms it notifies me. Additionally, when the reservoir is dry the system starts to beep… and will not stop until I slake its thirst!

While I love the look of the wooden humidors lined with Spanish Cedar, I also maintain a giant ‘coolidor’ – a large ice chest that is plastic and when secured is hermetically sealed. I maintain this one with Boveda packs for several reasons, not the least of which is that I keep it at my wife’s flat in Dallas, and I am not there to lovingly monitor and maintain it on a daily basis. One day I will be… but until then, I do not want to give my lovely wife (La Maitresse de Davidoff) extra work, even knowing that she appreciates the cigars as much as I do.

One important factor when planning your humidification is how often you plan to open your humidor. Every time you open it, humidity escapes. If you think it is a slow process, think again. This past weekend I looked at my hygrometer through the glass door of my cabinet. The display showed 66% humidity. I opened the door, took no more than a minute to select a cigar, and closed it immediately. The reading? 58%. The movie Gone in 60 Seconds could have been written about the safe humidification levels of my humidor. It does not jump back anywhere near as quickly, either; two hours later when I came inside the reading was up to 61% humidity.

The flipside of that coin is that when I am not in Dallas, my coolidor might remain sealed for several weeks on end (while she is welcome to almost any of my cigars, Leslie maintains her own wooden humidor with a collection of her cigars), and when I check in the levels are almost always right where I left them. Not once have I returned to Dallas after even two months’ absence to find the levels below (or above) the acceptable thresholds.

Distilled Water

I have mentioned in the above paragraphs that I only use distilled water for both seasoning and humidifying my humidors. While spring water may contain minerals that are good for your body, I know that any impurities that might damage my cigars (even just a little) will be removed by distillation process. I know some people think that ‘water is water’ and that is fine… except when they use tap water which in many cities is chlorinated and in others is just nasty. I spend thousands of dollars per year on cigars; I am not going to cheap-out on distilled water that costs less than $4 per gallon.

Digital Hygrometers

While this was not part of the original question, I feel it is an important point. If you cannot properly measure something then you cannot properly manage it, and having an accurate reading of humidity is extremely important. While many humidors come with beautiful analog hygrometers, these also come with instructions on how to calibrate them… and when necessary how to occasionally recalibrate them. How exactly am I to know if a hygrometer is inaccurate and needs to be recalibrated? Is it when I notice my cigars are drying out (even though the dial reads 67%)? Or maybe it is when my cigars are expanding and cracking because the humidity is way too high… even though the dial reads within the norms. Thank you, no… while I am mostly a traditionalist who prefers the beauty of wood over other (possibly more efficient) materials for my humidor, I am also a pragmatist who is happy to have the modern LCD screens monitoring my cigars… and the Bluetooth connection to my phone in case I am not paying attention. They are more accurate and do not require calibration.

Conclusion

Cigars are not an inexpensive hobby and we should respect them by spending the money to protect them. I told my students a story from twenty years ago of a client who bought a laptop for his daughter and asked me to take it to my office to do some work on it. He spent $4,000 on the laptop but he spent $14 on a laptop bag; as I was walking from my car to my office with the laptop bag strapped to my shoulder the strap broke, the bag fell, and the the very expensive laptop was destroyed. Spending a little extra to protect your investment is never money wasted. With that said, there is still effort that needs to go into maintaining our cigars; even the best humidification system needs to be monitored and adjusted or replenished from time to time. Yes, spend the money… but also make sure you spend the time.