How are you`re hops growing

beerdrinker · Post by **beerdrinker** » Monday Dec 10, 2007 11:17 pm

Have 3 hop strains growing,1 failed to come up this year???a pearle. the other 2 are going great(a hallertauer and tetanager) anyone else growing their own? first year yeilded next to nothing,now it looks to be taking over like a weed! Would like to see some pics of aussie grown hops and maybe some gardening tips! cheers

KEG · Post by **KEG** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 6:55 am

http://www.picobrewery.com/askarchive/growhops.htm
http://www.freshops.com/garden.html
http://www.byo.com/feature/116.html

keep in mind these are US seasons, so add 6 months onto the times of year they mention.

scanman · Post by **scanman** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 8:17 am

I got a hop vine fomr ebay. The seller was unsure of the variety, but it comes from the Wagga wagga area, so I might assume it may well be a Pride Of Ringwood variety.
Going well at the moment. I started it in a big pot but transplanted it to the ground last week and set up some wire for it to climb along the fence.
Its growing well with this warm humid Sydney weather we have been having for a few weeks now.

rwh · Post by **rwh** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 8:57 am

My Goldings has gone nuts. I built a 12 foot trellis for it and it ate that for breakfast and is now snaking its way along some horizontal strings that I tied from the top of the trellis to a nearby tree. I think it might eat the tree too.

I'll post some photos of it once I take them.

KEG · Post by **KEG** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 10:14 am

would love to see how it's going.

do you plan to leave it in the ground after the season, or lift it out and divide it further?

drsmurto · Post by **drsmurto** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 12:56 pm

I have 2 x goldings (both yet to sprout), a cluster that has started growing, a cascade that has 2 small leaves and a chinook that is going bonkers. Here is the chinook.

rwh · Post by **rwh** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 8:01 pm

OK, took the photo:

beerdrinker · Post by **beerdrinker** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 8:08 pm

http://i149.photobucket.com/albums/s45/ ... 010043.jpg heres my hallertau at ground level,is springing up all around the main rhizome!

beerdrinker · Post by **beerdrinker** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 8:11 pm

Looks like you`ll need an extention rwh! how tall is that!

KEG · Post by **KEG** » Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 10:14 pm

12 feet.

i wonder how difficult it would be (and whether or not it would be greatly detrimental) to train the plant with wire to grow laterally once it reaches a certain height.

rwh · Post by **rwh** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 9:16 am

Well, I'm doing that experiment. The trellis is 12 feet tall, and seeing as it got to the top in a few short weeks, I've had to improvise by running some string to a nearby tree. If you look carefully, you can see that it starts to snake horizontally at the top. The thing is it seems to want to always grow upwards, so I have to keep training it along the horizontal string (which is kinda hard 12 feet above the ground when you don't have a ladder.

The only detrimental bit about training it horizontally so far is that I've been a bit rough and snapped a few of the growing shoots off. Thankfully when that happens it seems to send out two new shoots from the last leaf bud.

drsmurto · Post by **drsmurto** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 9:36 am

My fence is only 6 foot so once it got to that height i am training them all to grow horizontally altho it doesnt want to do it so i have to train it everyday!

My cascade now has 4 leaves - WOot! DOubt i will get any cones of it this year.

Rob, did you get your goldings from cannabacae? I got 2 rhizomes form him and neither has grown any shoots.

rwh · Post by **rwh** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 9:52 am

drsmurto wrote:Rob, did you get your goldings from cannabacae?

Yep. It was one of the oversized ones, really huge, and cost $20 or so in shipping. Guess I'm reaping the rewards of all that stored energy now.

I got 2 rhizomes form him and neither has grown any shoots.

Hmm... That's weird, mine couldn't wait to shoot, in fact it had shoots on it when I took it out of the box (it had a week in the mail and then a few more days till I got around to planting it). Maybe contact him and ask what you should do.

KEG · Post by **KEG** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 10:25 am

rwh wrote:The only detrimental bit about training it horizontally so far is that I've been a bit rough and snapped a few of the growing shoots off. Thankfully when that happens it seems to send out two new shoots from the last leaf bud.

that's another thing i was considering doing - it's a fairly common pruning technique to make plants more bushy and prolific.

Kevnlis · Post by **Kevnlis** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 10:33 am

A less stressful way is to pinch or "FIM" the leading bud before it actually shows leaves. The new shoots should be easier to train in a different direction, though by nature it will always want to grow up to get closer to the sun.

rwh · Post by **rwh** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 11:01 am

I've found this source to be the most informative and interesting regarding hops growing:

Small Scale & Organic Hops Production

Trough Lolly · Post by **Trough Lolly** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 8:06 pm

I have Goldings and Chinook that are putting together their runners that typically yield the burrs and eventually, the flowers that I'm after. As for the PoR, it's barely stirred and it has about 2 inches of very thin runner poking out of the soil - very unusual. It's the one that normally takes off like a triffid. I'll post pics soon...

Cheers,
TL

P.S. The Cab Sav and Black Shiraz have done very nicely too!

beerdrinker · Post by **beerdrinker** » Wednesday Dec 12, 2007 11:35 pm

Thanks for the link rwh! my hallertau has already sprung a few hops, but no real smell to them,i picked them off and for the last few weeks its kinda gone dormant. Had a damn possum eat the tip of my favourite plant

I got mine last year off cannibacae from ebay. All 3 grew over 8feet last year but this year the pearle has refused to surface?

Lachy · Post by **Lachy** » Thursday Dec 13, 2007 12:21 pm

I bought three hop plants from an online nursery specialising in herbs and medicinal plants. I'm not absolutely certain as to their variety, however I am led to believe that they are most likely PoR.

As it turns out, there's no problem growing them in pots...

rwh · Post by **rwh** » Thursday Dec 13, 2007 1:35 pm

Wow, you should get a fair harvest out of those; depending on variety, a mature hops plant yields around 800g of hops per year.