Gawith, Hoggarth & Co. Dark Bird's Eye

GH Dark Birds Eye is another nice dark fired blend. When compared to ODF, DBE is more dark fired forward, more earthy and floral also and less sweet. It also has more strength so must be smoked in a smaller pipe. The tin note is musty, camp fire and earthy with the slightest Lakeland essence. Very nice. I also really like the shag cut. It lights up nice and fast. No Bite.

A dark brown shag with sweet, malty, smoky notes. Clearly a dual use tobacco, this immediately reminded me of the old White Ox RYO.

Works fine as a pipe tobacco. There is plenty of rich sweet taste to be had, with the KY predominant. Burns well, but benefits from some drying time, which is what it would get if it were carried around as a pouch tobacco.

This is a distinctive, niche tobacco, that works for me as a change up baccy. It's old school in a lot of ways and this is probably going to be a like or loathe blend for pipe smokers. It's about as subtle as a brick.

There is a distinct, acrid, almost plastic note that intrudes as the bowl progresses. I have noticed this aroma in G+H ropes and flakes. No idea what it starts out as or what it is supposed to be, but I am not a fan. It sits just barely the right side of tolerable for me.

Will ghost a pipe.

Edit May 17. After struggling with this baccy for a month or more I gave up. Just too harsh and too strong all round. I found it impossible to finish even small bowls. Have downrated the baccy accordingly. I hope my neighbour, who smokes RYO, has better luck with it.

I just finished a healthy sample of this I received a while back. I found this one to be very similar to Kendal Kentucky in all respects. I would probably like this and the Kendal blends much better if they had a wider cut. This keeps me from giving any of them 4 stars, but this one and the aforementioned Kendal blend do deserve more than 3 stars.

It is tasty and a taste I do enjoy even if it comes in a cut that I do not. I find this to be slightly soapy and slightly cigar like. It is strong, but not overwhelming; at least to me its not. While the blend has a lot of backbone, it is pretty easy to smoke. Like all GH blends I have tried so far, this one won't bite no matter how hard you try.

I wasn't sure what to make of this blend as most of the well-known, very strong tobaccos I bought to sample recently were a disappointment in some way. G&H's Happy Brown Bogie proved too overpowering to smoke and was better for me in my cheek. C&D's Old Joe Krantz and Byzantium were both let-downs for me, the former was just totally unsmokeable as it tasted of uncured, unripe Burley and the latter was just kind of flat and lacked balance.

This tobacco was a pleasant surprise. The bag note completely brought me back to a childhood spent farming a few acres of fire-cured dark Virginia tobacco, it had the smell of the 150-year-old tobacco barns full of oak smoke we used to cure our tobacco. The cut reminded me of the Bali Shag and Stokkebye tobacco I used to make hand-rolled cigarettes with years ago. The whole experience really reminded me of the green bag of Bali I used to buy from time to time which is now discontinued (it was either called Dark Virginia or Kentucky).

I pulled out of the bag enough to fill a small, briar churchwarden as it was the smallest bowl I had available and I'd read previous reviews cautioning against large or wide bowls for this tobacco. The tobacco out of the bag was dry, but I though a little extra drying was in order so I tore the really long strands of shag into smaller pieces and allowed it to dry for ten or so minutes. It turned out I pulled far too much out of the bag, as the tobacco did not compress as much as I thought it would. I proceeded to pack the bowl in the normal three steps I use with most tobaccos.

It took a match very easily, as shag does. It puffs up tremendously when first lit and it really didn't even need another light after the first charring light, but I lit again just to be certain the edges were going. The taste was straight tobacco, the taste of oak and smoked peat and leather. Just amazing. I ventured a retrohale. knowing that this had sunk me with OJK. It felt strong coming through my nose, with a tangy note and the slight wisp of Lakeland soapiness. I sat back in my chair and let this tobacco do its thing while I took long, slow sips. It burns very cooly, even with a former cigarette smoker pulling too hard and too often. The taste is not complicated, there aren't layers of flavor here to unravel. It's not overly simple, and though uncomplicated, there is some complexity as you move through the bowl. It was velvety near the beginning, but moved toward a tanginess in the last half of the bowl.

It's a quick burner, the small bowl I packed was done in twenty or thirty minutes. In fact, it surprised me, I thought I had gone out and upon striking the match for a re-light, noticed there was nothing but a very fine white ash. A surprising amount of ash, much more than expected. There was absolutely not a piece of dottle in there and the ash was as soft as silk. One more draw, and my mouth would have gotten quite the surprise.

Overall, I really enjoyed the honesty of this tobacco. It is strong, but not overpowering. The nicotine hit didn't bowl me over and it satisfied that almost ever present desire to smoke a cigarette.

*Even though I detected a faint aroma of Lakeland essence, I rated the flavoring as none, since I'm not sure it's even there. I may have just been influenced into finding it by reading reviews.

This had to be the very Tobacco, that Sherlock Holmes kept in the Persian slipper. Smooth, and amazingly mellow. A dark caldron of deep Virginia with a soft dark fired bass. I didn't find it as strong as some have claimed. But then again I've been chewing loose leaf tobacco for years. The shag cut is very fine, puff gently. No bite whatsoever. Luscious, mellow, deep and seductive, and the aroma is very nice.

This is a tobacco i dont cant regulary smoke. Best smoking time for me from March - May.

Tast is very full. Reminds me on to long roasted, speak to very dark brown roasted hazelnuts.

Nicotine too, special the last third of a bowl. Last time i bought it was round about 8 years ago. And it isnt gone. Every year 3 oz or so is my maximum.

Its hardly to recommand gerneral.

Belongs very much to the smoker. Because the Nic-tolerance

2-3 Stars.

this one is a wild stallion.. if you are a fan of stronger tobaccos like 1792, irish flake, royal yacht, etc.. give this one a try.. it has a pleasant subdued dark fired sort of flavor but also has a dash of lakeland essence to it.. very strong, very satisfying.. 4 stars for those who seek nicotene punches.. 3 stars for me, its good stuff

Returning to it.. July 2018.. this is what a Lakeland cigar would taste like.. unassuming shag like cut that packs the punch of a rope.. but burns fast.. slow puffing cadence brings out the best experience.. the Kentucky and Lakeland essence are the stars.. somewhere in the background just the most subtle Virginia sweetness.. Not my favorite style.. but I bet it would age well.. bringing a little more sweetness to the front.. maybe toning down the essence.. but then it wouldn't be what it's intended to be.. I would like to have this around if I wanted a cigar but couldn't afford one.. definitely hits that spot for me.. but the fast burn rate makes it sneak up on your heart rate.

I don't have too much to add on this one. I find it to be very similar to Kendal Kentucky. I keep a few tobaccos like this in my collection, but they are not my everyday smoke. Tastes more like Kentucky-cured Burley than Virginia to me, but what do I know? Virginia could be made to taste like this, I suppose, if cured in a certain way. This is not subtle. There are no fine nuances of flavor. This is man's 'baccy, must be sipped unless you are a better man than I, and yet now that I have tasted this and KK, these strong Burley shags are something I will always keep (small amounts of) around. Blowing this out my nose makes me feel like I'm taking snuff!

Not a bad tobacco, but not something I will smoke regularly. will gracefully finish my bag over the winter. By the way this will cake up your bowl lickety split!