2017 Hop Plantations, Show Us Your Hop Garden!

[bj2]

Interesting story Mardoo. What fertiliser do you use for flowering?

 

[Mardoo]

Power feed for fruits and flowers. I also do foliar feeds of potash. There are directions for that on the potash bottle.

https://www.bunnings.com.au/powerfeed-1-2l-flower-fruit-and-citrus-fertiliser-concentrate_p2962111

https://www.bunnings.com.au/manutec-450ml-liquid-potash-plus_p2961694

 

[fdsaasdf]

Another evening and another half a dozen grasshoppers squished. The little bastards are prolific!

 

[Benn]

..Beautiful

 

[Rocker1986]

I'm hoping for similar up here over the weekend, for the hops and the lawn...

 

[ScottyDoesntKnow]

My 1st year Chinook seem to be going ok considering I haven't given them alot of love, just picked one and gave it a squeeze... springs backs, feels light and dry and sounds like paper. Not much lupulin on the outside but its clearly visible inside and smells amazing! Probably got a dozen that look like this at the moment and heaps of smaller growing and new burrs.

 

[Rocker1986]

Some flowering fertiliser will give them a boost too. I did it with my Hallertau last year after it produced a few small harvests of what turned out to be between 1 and 4/5 grams. The final harvest, after hitting them with the fertiliser was 4 times that at 20ish grams and the flowers were bigger too. I'm using it again this season.

 

[ScottyDoesntKnow]

Does anyone know what the little dark coloured threads on the outside of my hop cones are? They all seem to have it but then end up disappearing.

 

[Rocker1986]

Not sure what they are but they largely disappear on mine too. Having said that, the sheet underneath the rack on the ones I was drying over the last couple of days caught a lot of those things when I picked the flowers up to weigh them.

Speaking of which, I got 78g once they'd dried out. Not quite down to the estimated 70g but close enough for rock N roll. I weighed them earlier in the day at 86g, and they dropped 8g in about 3 hours. I thought they might dry too much if I'd left them until I got home again after my second half so I just bagged them at 78g. Currently residing in the freezer, and thinking of brewing a pale ale with them as late additions to see how they taste compared to the commercial ones I've always used.

 

[Belgrave Brewer]

Does anyone know what the little dark coloured threads on the outside of my hop cones are? They all seem to have it but then end up disappearing.

Completely normal...they'll fall off by the time the flowers are ready to pick. Part of the process of going from burr to cone.

 

[ScottyDoesntKnow]

Would you suggest I use that as an indicator? I was going to pick some this afternoon that I think look ready but I really have no idea, this is my first time growing.

 

[Rocker1986]

They should also feel dry and papery, and make a sort of dry rustling noise when you squeeze them. That's usually the indicator I look for along with the yellow lupulin. The middle stalk of the cone easily snapping is another indicator.

 

[Belgrave Brewer]

Would you suggest I use that as an indicator? I was going to pick some this afternoon that I think look ready but I really have no idea, this is my first time growing.

I would not use that as any indication. Wind can blow them off the cones. I posted a video a few pages back that will give you a good idea of when to pick. As Rocker1986 says, should have a very papery sound when rolled in your fingers. I like to pick them late as they tend to have more flavour and aroma compounds.

 

[Rocker1986]

I noticed some of mine had what looked like little spider web shit in them, is this an issue? Most of those I just threw on the ground and didn't harvest but does it matter?

 

[Belgrave Brewer]

I noticed some of mine had what looked like little spider web shit in them, is this an issue? Most of those I just threw on the ground and didn't harvest but does it matter?

Don't use them if you see webs on them. You can't avoid bugs and spiders, they will exist on the plants so try and screen them out. The last thing you want is to dry hop with a dead spider sitting in your fermentor.

If you see a lot of webs, it could be spider mite and that is considered a contaminant in quantity. Spider mites can be a serious threat to your harvest.

 

[Matplat]

Well the results are in... are you ready?

Cascade - 20g
Victoria - 40g
Goldings - 14g

These are wet weights from second year plants I wasnt expecting stellar yields, but at least enough for one brew? Clearly I'm doing something wrong. I suspect it is to do with the pots, getting hot in the sun, and being too small for the appetite of a hop plant. I also think that the chicken shit pellets that most of the growing season rested on were insufficient.

I am going to continue feeding them the powerfeed to see if I can get a second harvest out of them this season.... But I will try getting them in the ground for next year, even in a rental.

 

[Rocker1986]

Don't use them if you see webs on them. You can't avoid bugs and spiders, they will exist on the plants so try and screen them out. The last thing you want is to dry hop with a dead spider sitting in your fermentor.

If you see a lot of webs, it could be spider mite and that is considered a contaminant in quantity. Spider mites can be a serious threat to your harvest.

I had a feeling that might be the case which is why I didn't keep those particular flowers. They were only on a small percentage of cones, the vast majority were fine. I probably won't use them for dry hopping at this point so they'll all be boiled but yeah don't really want spiders or mites or webbing in my beer haha.

 

[Rocker1986]

It's pretty early in the harvest season so you may well get more if you keep up the flowering fertiliser. I got **** all off my Hallertau last season at this point but by late March I had enough for a single batch. That was a first year in a pot.

I think after the first year they really need to be moved to a bigger home than a pot though. The Cascade I have went straight into a big planter box, first year this season and first harvest was about 275-280g wet and there are more to come. The cones I picked almost filled a 5L handy pail. I'm quite shocked, actually. Didn't expect anything like that from a first year plant.

 

[Matplat]

So I put all those picked i the dehydrator for the afternoon, and I'm bloody glad I did (I was thinking of thowing them in tonights brew wet), open the dehydrator expecting a nice fresh hoppy aroma, but all I get is a vegetal stink, does that mean I picked to early or too late? I was sure to only pick the ones that felt papery, which was quite easy to pick up because I still had some that were fully soft and unripe for comparison.

Either way I'm pretty sure they're headed for the bin?

 

[Rocker1986]

I often find they smell like that. It's only when I crush them up in my fingers that they smell like the pellets do.