Dennis is right - if it's fuzzy it's mold. I find that it wipes off easily too. It forms on the surface first and if there is only a little bit, then wipe the cigar off and smoke it. If it is on thick, or on say over 25% of the surface and/or it can be seen in the filler (at the foot), or maybe has distorted the shape of the cigar, then I'd chunk it. I don't freak when I find mold. It's the same as bread mold and there's no getting around your cigars being exposed to the spores - every cigar in your house is "contaminated" right now. The only control you have is that over the rh and temp. I've gotten more mold in boxes from vendors than I've found in my humis and I've sent some back and kept some where there were only two very lightly affected cigars. These were removed and once the box of cigars was placed in appropriate conditions, the mold did not spread. Granted, I live in an arid climate and mold has just been a negligible issue. (Out of curiosity I checked the rh in a sack of bread once and I don't remember what it was, but it was way high, maybe in the 90s, and much more conducive, as we've all seen, to formation of mold.) IMO, mold doesn't warrant an emergency environmental response action - if they're not in cellophane, they go in a baggie and then maybe in a separate box in the humi. I've never noticed a difference in a cigar that I knew to have had mold on it right before I lit it.
On the plume, I guess I've seen tiny sparkles on a wrapper before, but when I see very small, bright white, non-fuzzy specks and patches (I understand they're crystals, but I'm pretty sure crystalline patterns can be discerned only under a microscope), then I know I'm looking at plume, or bloom. I count it lucky and light that baby up.
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