Blue smoke/Brown smoke

[mshade]

While smoking a fine cigar on a beautiful Autumn afternoon here in the Northeast yesterday, the sun backlit the smoke swirling from the end of the cigar and was quite mesmerizing, and I noticed something that I never quite took note of before. The color of the smoke coming from the end of the cigar was steely blue, while the smoke that I blew out of my mouth was a dull brown color which is not unusual, but as the ash grew longer, some of the brown smoke started to mix in with the blue from the end of the cigar. But after the ash fell off, the color at the end was again all blue. Ok, I thought if I would purge the cigar most of the smoke would be brown, but no, blue again.

Anyhow, the cigar was fantastic and the weather a bonus this time of the year in the Northeast.

So what's the explaination for the different colors of smoke?