May 29th the Magnum hops reached the top of their rope (15 feet tall). The cascade and Nugget hop bines reached the top of their ropes May 21st (13 feet tall). I predicted by June 1st this would happen and apparently nailed that guess.
This is the second year for these hops. The first year is fun to watch how fast the hop bines grow, but that’s nothing compared to the second year. The first year a lot of the hop plants energy goes into establishing the root stock also known as the crown. By the second year, the crown is established and the sprouts come up earlier than if you planted hop rhizomes.
My hop sprouts survived a few frosts where tomatoes would have surely died. Hops are hardy once established. I lost a Mt. Hood hop plant I had planted in a container this spring. We had some 50 mph winds and it snapped them right off – the rhizome apparently couldn’t handle it – no more hop shoots / sprouts replaced them. They probably would have survived if I had them trained on a rope. They were about a foot long and I had not yet decided where to trellis them.
Here in Minnesota the general date for frost safe planting is May 15th. I kept my hop plants buried under leaves to try and keep the ground cold and the hop crowns dormant as long as possible. I checked on them today (April 8th) and the hop sprouts were pushing up the leaves so I had to un-bury them. Hopefully they won’t freeze (down to 32 degrees last night).
Cascade Sprouts
These are second year hops so I am expecting a much better yield than last year (about 3 pounds between the 3 hop plants – a good first year harvest). I guess we’ll see if they freeze or not. Even if they do, there will be new shoots to replace them. Second year hops with an established crown / root stock and stored energy from last year.
Early Sprouts
I am still contemplating a new hop trellis rigging. If nothing else, I will go with 2 ropes per plant instead of the one rope per hop hill used last year. That in itself should at least double my harvest. The established hop plants will have plenty of energy to support 6 bines per plant (3 per rope).
Magnum Hops
The sprouts look albino and growing sideways from being weighed down and have not been exposed to sunlight yet. I will also have to trim the rhizomes to keep the plants from spreading in all directions. I will cut a circle with a shovel about 8 inch radius from the center of the plant and pull out the hop rhizomes on the outside of the circle.
Before you can decide what variety of hops to plant, you need to know the characteristics of different varieties of hops. The variety you choose depends mainly on the styles of beers and ales you like to drink.
Two main characteristics of hop cones:
Bittering – measured in IBUs (International Bitterness Units – according to the IBU scale). The bittering attribute of hops is used to counteract the sweetness of the malt in the beer or ale. Alpha acids and beta acids of the hop contribute to the bittering effect.
Aroma – there is no scale to measure aroma, it is used to impart a pleasurable aroma or “nose” to beers and ales, also referred to as a finishing hop. Essential oils of the hop cone are the source of aroma.
There are other characteristics that hops contribute to brews:
Natural preservative
Flavoring – various attributes such as – spicy, piney, citrus, woody, floral…
Calming effect
All hops have both qualities of bitterness and aroma, it is the proportion of each that determines if it is called a bittering hop, an aroma hop or some hops are in the middle and considered both bittering and aroma hop. The main component of the hop cone is lupulin, a yellow powdery component of the female hop cone. It contains the resins of the hop cone.
Here is a comprehensive list of the varieties of hops
So depending upon the beer styles you like to drink and or brew, determines which hop varieties to grow (assuming they will grow in your climate and soil). The above list provides the name of the hop, country of origin and alpha acid percentage (bitterness). There are many hop description pages out there, this one is the most comprehensive list of hop varieties I have found. You will only be able to buy a few varieties of hop rhizomes depending upon your country and some on this list are proprietary (not commercially available).
Beers and Ales – the difference between beers and ales is the type of yeast used and temperature of the wort (mash/sugars) during the fermentation process.
This post would go on forever if I listed every beer style and hops used so I won’t attempt that. Checkout the above referenced link to get your hop rhizome list together (you can sometimes find hop plants for sale). Depending upon where you live, you may be able to plant right now (ground is still frozen here in Minnesota) but warmer regions can plant now.
One more resource I stumbled across http://www.hopunion.com/hopunion-variety-databook.pdf
One of my most popular posts will list a variety of online sources to:
In cold climates it is important to overwinter hop plants / protect them from sub-zero temperatures. Hops do fairly well on their own but can be killed off if the ground is unprotected and hard freezes the ground. Snow will insulate the ground but occasionally the snow will be blown clear or animals may dig the snow away from the underground hop crowns (started as hop rhizomes).
Protect Cascade Hop Crowns
No sense taking any chances of losing your hop plants to the weather. All it takes is a layer of mulch – I used 6 inches of leaves and grass I bagged while mowing. This also helps in the Minnesota climate to keep the ground cold enough in the spring to prevent hop sprouts from sprouting too soon and then freeze. Generally they will send up new shoots if the first hop shoots freeze and die off but why waste the root stock energy.
When sub-freezing temperatures have past in the spring, You just clear the mulch and and the hop crown will send up shoots as the ground warms.
Unless you want the hops to spread in all directions, you will want to trim the hop rhizomes by digging down and cutting the lateral running rhizomes and pull them up. You can plant these in other areas if you wish or give or sell them to friends and fellow hop growers and homebrewers. I will be cutting the rhizomes about a one foot radius from the center of the crown (two foot diameter to contain the hop plants). They are self propagating and will travel in all directions from the crown.
One problem with not containing the spread of hops is they will soon mix with other nearby varieties and can be hard to distinguish variety and/or you will have 2 or more variety of hop bines growing together and makes harvesting and separating the different varieties of hop cones difficult if not impossible. My varieties are 5 to 6 feet apart so with a little effort, I can keep them separate. You need to know which hops are which for accurate beer and ale recipes. You especially do not want to mix bittering hops with aroma hops.
That’s it, just a layer of mulch – leaves, grass, hay, straw or compost to protect the hop crowns and the organic material will also leach into the ground as an organic fertilizer. Next years hop yield will be even better!
Hop Sprouts – all 3 of my hop rhizomes have sprouted! Magnum was first followed by Nugget and finally the Cascade. The hop rhizomes were planted April 11, 2009. When growing hops, this is your first sign of progress – hop sprouts.
The Magnum sprouted April 21 (10 days), the Nugget sprouted April 24 and the Cascades finally broke ground April 26th, 2009. I had mulched heavily over all 3 mounds to keep the ground cold. I was attempting to delay sprouting until after the danger of frost. It appeared to work . Generally May 15th is the safe time to plant in Minnesota. I’ll have to keep an eye on the weather and cover the bines if it drops below freezing.
Magnum Hops Have Sprouted
Now I just have to worry about a possible frost, rabbits, deer and maybe squirrels will dig up the rhizomes – they dig up my garden. Of course I will also have to worry about insects, viruses and other hop diseases like powdery mildew, downy mildew, high winds and hail. Hail obliterated a friend of mine’s hops last year. They never recovered – whole hop season ruined!
I am still contemplating on how I am going to rig the ropes for the bines. I have the materials – rope, pulleys, hardware… I have a couple of ideas. Functionality and ease of lowering the hop bines without needing a ladder (once the pulleys are fastened high up on my garage).
Cascade Rhizome Produces Hop Sprouts
I am going to use a hybrid idea I have which is a combination of some other tricks I read about. The hop bines will be lowered when they get close to the top of the rope. I will loop the bines on a hook type apperatus, possibly a mountable half circle hose rack. When they near the top again, lower and loop the bines again.
This will effectively allow them to grow as long as possible and keep them off the ground. I will have to allow breathing room so the bines will not suffer from dampness and possible molds or mildew (powdery mildew, downy mildew…). I am sure I will need to make adjustments along the way. Wish me luck.
If anyone has ideas about how to do this or how they have done this, let me know. The whole idea here is to share ideas and especially what works.
The first major milestone has ocurred, all the hop rhizomes have sprouted! Magnum, Nugget and Cascade – bitter, bitter and aroma hops. I have to finalize my bine rigging ideas and implement them.
I am still investigating how I want to feed the hops, organic and naturally of course. Green sand, fish emulsions, compost tea and looking into mycelium products to permeate the soil bring nutrients to the rhizomes / root stock.
