Hop Garden

Sunday, August 2nd, 2009 at 8:09 pm

Hop Garden Starting to Flower

A hop garden is mesmerizing to watch grow. Each day there is new growth and never a boring watch. You will find yourself checking them every day, it is that addicting. Although these hops bines have topped out their trellises, they are now spreading lateral shoots out from the hop bines and growing wider. I call these guys the 3 amigos – Nugget, Magnum and Cascade.

These hop plants are also starting to flower. It starts with the hop burrs or florets. The burrs or florets are comprised of spiny looking styles. This is when the female hop flowers are receptive to hops pollen. As the hop flower matures the styles will fall off.

Hop Flowers Forming from Burrs / Florets

The flowers fill in with petals and lupulin glands becoming hop cones. They look like green pine cones. Some hops are round and some hop cones are long depending on the hop variety. Hop Cones are the harvest we are after (unless grown for shade / cover). You can expect from 1/2 to 2 pounds of dried hops per plant (after a couple of years). First year hops expend a lot of energy on establishing the crown or root system.

As you can see here, hops like to go high. The Magnum hop bine is 15 feet tall. The cascade and Nugget bines are over 20 feet tall. You can’t see it in the above photo but there are hop bines looped around hose hangers (an experiment in bine height with limited vertical real estate – see some other posts on this blog and you will see it).

Start planning your hop garden now for next year. Select a site, work the soil – dig at least a foot down and 2 feet in diameter. Amend the soil with compost and other organic material – grass, leaves… make sure it is mostly soil and organic material is well mixed with the soil. Figure how you will rig the hop bines (to a pole, a deck, up the side of a building… you have til next spring to actually worry about it). Start reading up on growing hops and you will be well on your way to a successful hop garden.

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Growing Hops from Rhizomes

Tuesday, March 31st, 2009 at 5:12 am

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Hop Rhizomes Ready to Plant - Humulus Lupulus

Growing hops from hop rhizomes is easy and almost foolproof. Hop plants (humulus lupulus) are a very hardy perennial and once established, will provide all the home brew hops you will need. Hops are dioecious (male and female) only the females produce hop cones. When you start with rhizones, they are female so you don’t have to worry about that. You can expect a hop yield of half to two pounds of dried hop cones per plant. If you are into home brewing, growing hops will save you a lot of money and put you in control of your supply and avoid the hop shortage.

Hops grow best vertically so plant where they will have room to grow – at least 16 feet. Hops can grow from 25 to 40 feet in a single growing season! The first year the crown is establishing itself so hop cone yield will be much less that following years. Hops will need rope or twine for the bines (not vines) to climb. Hop bines cling to the rope by wrapping clockwise (you train them) around the rope or twine and stiff “hairs” hold on to the rope. It is best to rig the ropes so they can be lowered for harvesting the hop flowers (cones).

Hops rhizomes should be planted in well drained, fertile soil between 6.0 and 8.0 PH once the threat of frost has past. Hops require plenty of water, sun and nutrients to sustain their high growth rate. A good organic fortified soil with decent drainage and lots of sunlight will give the hop rhizomes the environment they need. During the growing season fertilize with compost tea and other gentle organic fertilizers.

The hop plants should be spaced a minimum of 3 feet apart – 5 feet apart if different varieties. Generally hops rhizomes are planted horizontally with the white buds facing up, about 1 inch deep one hop rhizome per mound. A slight mounding of the soil helps with drainage and does not let the root stalk or crown of the plant drown in heavy rainfalls or waterings.

These are rhizomes, they do self propagate by sending out more underground shoots (rhizomes). So if you do not want them taking over your hop garden, you will have to “limit” the root area by trimming the root stalk or crown. You can take these cuttings and plant elsewhere or give to friends to grow there own hops or sell them.

I will be posting about this years batch of Nugget, Magnum and Cascade hops from rhizome to harvest so check back at least monthly. Those are the actual rhizomes I will be planting in the picture above. You will see the methods and rigging of the ropes I use – there are many ways to do this, I go for ease and efficiency.

There is still time to do this this season so get to it. The more friends you get interested in growing hops and homebrewing, the more home brews you will have available to you. Home brew beers and ales are meant to be shared and is a growing hobbie for many. Join a local homebrewing group, join some forums, read some books on growing hops. You can never know to much. Hop onboard!