> Wow! Is this true for plants other than orchids? I'm a smoker and I'd
> hate to transmit virus' to my plants. I've never seen any problems with
virus' in my plants, but should I be worried?
I'm brand new to this list; I'll be sending my intro message pretty soon, but
I do know about tobacco mosaic. It mostly infects plants of the nightshade
family, tomatoes and potatoes (sp?) are *very* easy to infect, as are
eggplant. Your plants and yourself would be a lot healthier if you
stopped smoking, as the tomato disease FAQ says (but I'll admit
it, I'm a smoker too and grow tomatoes. It is said that hand contact
is a sure killer, but last year my mother threw all of her cigarrettes
into my tomatoes, or in a bed that was about to be tomatoes, and I
haven't seen any sign of the disease. It lives about three years in
the soil as I recall). I setup a small experiment to see if I could purposely
infect a potted tomato and I didn't see any signs of the disease, but
possibly precursors, it started looking stressed after awhile (yellow/
green leaves instead of deep green), but no true mosaic.
Hope this helps. (Oh, and a tobacco grower would *not* want his
plants to be infected. I think the precautions are a lot greater today
than in the past.)