Is the tin date stamped? I often buy "new" tins and they are well aged already. 13 years on my last purchase. A lot of these tobaccos are also aged before they are tinned. I think you are just lucky.
Not wanting to come across as biased but, I've never had mold on any English/Irish tobacco. Even aged/vintage tobacco. St. James flake aplomb with plume, you lucky man!
Out of the two that I got, one had more plume than the other. The one that didnt have as much was quite a bit drier. I got a tin of SJF about a year ago that had a ton of plume, but the flakes were nearly soggy in comparison to the boxes.
I always love it when I place a tobacco order and the tobacco that shows up has an old tin date on it. Nothing like getting aged tobacco, especially those that have plume on them. The nice thing about the 250g boxes from Samuel Gawith is that they sit around longer than the 50g tins, so there's always a good chance those will have a bit of age on them when they arrive.
"Plume is synonymous with Bloom."
I would be interested to know which dictionary makes this reference. Plume and bloom are not synonymous. The word the OP should have used was bloom as Hagley correctly points out.
Regards,
Jay.
I could be wrong, but I don't believe Rich was referencing a dictionary but instead the words as used by those in the tobacco trade.
Also, though SG flake can be moist, SJ is often very moist. I've read on the forums that it smokes better that way, and though I love it, my palate is unable to discern such differences.