2012 Hop Plantations

[MelbVTBrews]

Nice work all. Comin along very nicely. Most of mine have sprouted - Fuggles took the ealry lead but Super Alpha and Saaz have reigned him in. The English can never hold on to a lead.

Off to Northern Vic tomorrow for day 1 of building brand spankin new hopyard. Gunna be a good day. 13 varieties to go in the following weekend...

:icon_offtopic:
Thought this article may be of interest to people building a trellis.
http://www.tpub.com/steelworker2/70.htm

 

[Dave70]

Now, thanks to ratchie, my hoppy empire has expanded to include cascade and Hallertau along with the Chinook purchased from Dr's.

They seem to have stuck their little green heads out and said '**** this cold for a joke, I'm going back to sleep till it warms up a bit'.

It was 2 deg at home when I left this morning, I don't blame em.

 

[jezza79]

Hallertau from Ratchie

 

[Batz]

I have cluster, mt. hood, cascade, goldings and victoria.


Cluster is going off.


My bamboo trellis, I did a couple of very high ones and a few well, high ones to see how they go.

If anyone around here needs bamboo I have plenty, 15-20 metres high is not a problem. Free to brewers

Batz

 

[Yob]

Nice one Batz.. They'll be getting plenty of sun then from the look of it!!

Looks great

Ed: phone sux dogs nuts

 

[Dave70]

Chinook babies next to my morning cup of heart-starter for perspective.

 

[hoppy2B]

Any sign of burrs yet Dave?

 

[Yob]

Fuggles is going for it... 3rd year zomes rock



also completed some string lines to the front of the brewshed..



sort of made a truss from the 2 rope lines..

:icon_cheers:

 

[Fish13]

Unless they're old posts, I wouldn't worry. Arsenic got phased out years ago.

koppa logs - CCA treated and CCA stands for Copper Chromium Arsenic.

I deal with it everyday and the levels needed to kill you its a metric fuckload.

Anyway my hops are in the ground. I think i have killed the Hallertau and my cascade rhizome - thanks legendko should be alright.

Using the washing machine water to water them :S

 

[Filfy]

My chinook would be at least 200mm high now. Really need some warmer weather (which isn't happening this week) to really get things going methinks.

 

[hoppy2B]

My Fuggles is the only thing moving along at the moment. Second year zome, didn't do much last year, hopefully get cones this year. They're meant to like cool climate so that probably explains the early growth.

 

[Batz]

Mine are mostly going off now, Mt Hood seems to be struggling.
Bloody chooks pecked the middle out in a few that slowed them it a bit.

batz

 

[Dave70]

Any sign of burrs yet Dave?

Goddam it, is that one? Tell me if it is cos its the first time I've grown hops and I don't want to be hopping my beers with ******* burrs..

 

[drsmurto]

The beast has awoken

Victoria broke the surface weeks ago and there are vast numbers of shoots already 10cm high.

Today i spotted the first chinook shoot, once the beast breaks the surface i have only a matter of weeks to sort out strings for it to climb to point them in the direction of the fence rather than taking over the vegie patch. The chooks managed to get under the fence i crudely constructed* last weekend and gave the ground a good digging over. I suspect that pissed the beast off. The chooks should count themselves lucky to have been saved from a certain death.

* chicken wire, tomato stakes and string - held together with faith and bugger all else :lol:

 

[grimpanda]

I'm sure this has been discussed, but what is the consensus on limiting the number of bines growing from each rhizome? i.e: cutting them off at ground level

My 3-year-old Hallertau 'zomes are rocketing off, each have around 25 shoots varying between 5 and 15 inches above the ground.

Summer 2012 was the first time I had a decent harvest, and I can't for the life of me remember if I cut them or just let them fight it out amongst themselves.

 

[hoppy2B]

I'm sure this has been discussed, but what is the consensus on limiting the number of bines growing from each rhizome? i.e: cutting them off at ground level

My 3-year-old Hallertau 'zomes are rocketing off, each have around 25 shoots varying between 5 and 15 inches above the ground.

Summer 2012 was the first time I had a decent harvest, and I can't for the life of me remember if I cut them or just let them fight it out amongst themselves.

Last summer was my first ever go at growing hops and I am happy with the yields I picked up. I went to the insane extreme of trying and mostly succeeding training each bine to a separate string. I didn't trim anything off.
Dr Smurto has a good easy to manage method, where he just has a couple of posts 3 or 4 metres high with mesh strung up between and lets them grow wild on that. Gets a good yield with little work.

 

[drsmurto]

For ease of harvesting, commercial growers trim back the bines numbers to 4-6 per plant (from what i have read).

Does that result in higher yields? I haven't seen anything other than homebrewing urban mythology to support that theory.

I let my plants do what they want to within reason - i keep them from invading my vegie patch. I use tent pegs to put string from the ground to the fence and then string from the fence to the trellis above. They are allowed to climb all on their own and they do so. Plants have been evolving for millions of years, why people think they require help to climb when they are a climbing plant is beyond me.

There are plenty of people here who get much higher yields than me. Given how many factors are involved in growing a plant - soil type, soil pH, position relative to the sun, fertilisers, competion from other plants/roots, water, latitude, temperature etc - it's hard to work out the 'ideal' situation.

As a first year hop grower i was as guilty as everyone else for babying my plants, daily weeding, watering, fertiliser, training them, picking off bugs, spraying them with organic homemade pest sprays. I trained them horizontally across the chook run as i didn;t have a trellis for the first 3 seasons. I also had several varieties. Now i have just 2 (Victoria and Chinook). Drove my partner insane. This is my 6th season and i am at the other end of the scale. I haven't removed last years growth from the trellis, they haven't been weeded or fertilised since the bags of horse manure they got covered with at the end of April. Water is the only thing they we get until next Aprils feed of manure.

I've kept records of my yields every year and am getting between 15-20% less now than i did in the 2nd and 3rd year for about 500% less effort. YMMV, enjoy the obsession until something new and shiny grabs your attention!

 

[paulhill]

So iv got my fist crop of hops sticking its head out of the ground
since I rent, Iv gone with pots. yes I know this is not the best, so i made sure i got the biggest pots i could find.

I got some plastic 205L drums and cut them in half. This cost me about $10 a pot. the potting mix cost more

imm still thinking about what imm going to do with trestles
so looking forward to using my own hops

id also love to THANK thebeemann and gollani51 both are great guys


so the varieties i have are

hellertau (Golani51)
cascade (Golani51)
Saaz (thebeemann)
Hersbrucker (thebeemann)
fuggels (ebay )


Bottom is the hellertau and the top is the cascade


left is the hersbrucker right is the saaz


this is the fuggles

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

Here in Canberra my second year Herbsrucker and Saaz have broken through recently. Cascade is about 7" long and the chinook...well....

Two small rhizomes planted in a wine barrel last year - both shot out 25 each and are up to 10" now. I trimmed one right back to try the 'lose the first bines' theory. It still hasn't really hit back yet. The other one I was trying to leave to go wild (wish I'd seen doc Smurto's post before just now) but disease concern got the better of me and I halved the number of bines...

 

[jameson]

So iv got my fist crop of hops sticking its head out of the ground
since I rent, Iv gone with pots. yes I know this is not the best, so i made sure i got the biggest pots i could find.

I got some plastic 205L drums and cut them in half. This cost me about $10 a pot. the potting mix cost more

imm still thinking about what imm going to do with trestles
so looking forward to using my own hops

id also love to THANK thebeemann and gollani51 both are great guys


so the varieties i have are

hellertau (Golani51)
cascade (Golani51)
Saaz (thebeemann)
Hersbrucker (thebeemann)
fuggels (ebay )

View attachment 57186
Bottom is the hellertau and the top is the cascade

View attachment 57187
left is the hersbrucker right is the saaz

View attachment 57185
this is the fuggles

Do you have a sorce for the 205l drums? Was thinking today I could use on to set up a drip system. while running the chiller water in there for recycling.
Thanks Jameson