2010 Hop Plantations

[waggastew]

The harvest has begun at my place (Mid North Coast of NSW) with an initial haul of 145g wet. I just snipped them off the plants with secauters as they are not all ready. Mixture or Chinook, Goldings, Mt Hood and Saaz (my Cascade is only just ticking along). In the winter I will replant them further apart as they have all grown together. Will make and interesting mix for my first Harvest Ale. Will dry the hops as I pick them and then try and use the last pick wet.

Many more coming along ranging from just about ready to just forming spurs.

My hop pole worked well too. Basically a pole with a bracket at the top with a rope strung through like a flag pole. I tied a hoop to the rope and attached the twine strings to it. Came down and went back up no problems!

PS. My hands smell like hops....mmmm hops!

 

[clarkey7]

Harvest day for 1 of my plants today too!

2nd year Chinook 276g wet after leaves and stems snipped off.

Should be able to manage an IPA for my harvest ale with a combination of my 2nd year POR and Chinook flowers.

I'll harvest POR tomorrow...







Also Brewed 44L of Galaxy Pale Ale B)

PB

 

[under]

Do you guys wait until all the buds are fully mature then pick. Or pick them as they are ready (like tomatoes)?

I have around 20 bud that I think are ready (turned paper like and no resiny, they have also slight browning. Heres some pics.

 

[waggastew]

My plants have been the ground for all of 8 months so probably not the best person to ask. From what I understand most commercial setups prune back their vines to the ground early in the season so that they all grow (and ripen) at the same point in time. I did not do this so I figure that I better pick them when the individual flowers are ready. If you wait until they are all ripe then some are gonna be a bit overdone?

From the photo they look ready to pick (signs of browning at the ends). The general consensus seems to be pick when they are 'papery' and only spring back partially when you give em a squeeze.

 

[Lecterfan]

I really wish one of the highly learned hop growing boffins from this site would do an article all about picking/harvesting, storing and using.

But then again, if I learn the hard way then I'll be part of the clandestine cult and won't care about all the new growers...

Or I could just shut up and keep drinking.

 

[felten]

like this one? http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...;showarticle=91

 

[proudscum]

like this one? http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...;showarticle=91

Bookmarked +1

 

[Lecterfan]

like this one? http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...;showarticle=91

Aaaah DAMMIT! Honestly I searched both manually and using the search function. I found the hop register and hop galleries etc etc but didn't find this one.


Thanks Felten,

humbly yours etc... :wacko:


edit: did another search and of course it was top of the list. Feeling like a dickhead is good for character development. I must have developed quite a lot by now.

 

[insane_rosenberg]

Hey Melbourne Growers,

How are your plantations standing up to the heat and wind today? It's one of my big concerns for my plantation next year.

 

[NickB]

Moving house recently has really thrown out my ability to pick the hops (they stayed, I moved), however was up at the old place on Friday and found that the 2nd year Chinook had gone ballistic due to all the rain and now all the heat.

Will head up next weekend to pick the first batch, and judging by the burrs on the remainder of the plant, sometime in the next month or so to pick again....

View attachment 43727
Chinook going a bit crazy


View attachment 43728
Closeup of the cones already formed (at a guess, probably about 25-30 of them all up)


View attachment 43729
The burrs on the laterals, just ready to form cones very soon....



Cheers

 

[Lebowski]

My tiny first year cascade harvest.. hopefully they were ready to pick, felt papery and had a little bit of browning on the leaves.

 

[clarkey7]

Got 119g from a second year POR plant today and left quite a few "not quite ready" cones on for next weekend.
There were also plenty of burrs forming on my 2nd year plants, so it looks like I'll be harvesting again in a month.
I might get a small crop from the first year plants...but they are taking their time.

I'm no expert...still learning. Didn't really get much last year to brew with so definitely haven't brewed a lot with home grown hops. I have included pics for people to remove the mystery. Enjoy.

Some I left behind. You can see plenty of luplin, but not papery.
Todays haul of POR.

Too crispy.
My effort at displaying when a hop is ready.
In my opinion - This from left to right is: almost, perfect, a bit past it but still usable.


You can see I'm not putting any hop companies out of business, but it's great fun.

Cheers,

PB

 

[Stinger]

I am probably at the stage of harvesting the Cascades and Chinook with Saaz just at the early flowering stage


Cascades



Chinook


Saaz

The plan is to harvest and brew on same day Thinking a pale ale will be the go

 

[DUANNE]

i have about 30 or so nearly ripe cones on my first year hallertau but around 200 or more burrs in various stages of develepment at the moment.can any one tell me if this is normal, and if it is then do i ust do a staggerd picking type of arangement.

 

[felten]

Picked about an ounce today that looked ripe before the hot weather/wind hit, still have double that on the plant in various stages as well. They definitely don't all ripen at the same time.

 

[DUANNE]

thanks for that. it makes me wonder how the big producers do it pulling all of the crop down at one time.

 

[kelbygreen]

didnt some one say they cut them back so all the shoots come up at once. So they all produce cones the same time?

 

[Lecterfan]

Well I finally got a heap of photos but fucked if I know how to make them less than 2mb...even when I send them to a zip file they are bigger than 2mb.

You know what hop bines and flowers look like, I have a few of them and I am excited about it! Whacky doo..,,,yaaaaayyyy...who gives a shit...

 

[Lecterfan]

Actually...from L to R...hersbrucker, spinach, cascade, pumpkin and chinook (chinook mostly in the shadows).

 

[Rotgut]

Thought I'd try a bit of "Flood Irrigation" on my Saaz down here in Melbourne..