Keeping Hops Alive When Not Home?

[Swifty]

I've got all my hops at my parents place and they are heading to perth for four weeks. I might be able to get someone to drop in halfway through their trip but otherwise they are very much out of everyone's way, including me (300km round trip). Has anyone got any ideas how to keep them alive whilst the weather is warm? Can't use a drip system as the water will be turned off in case of a problem. Will they last two weeks without water and will soaking them kill them?? Any help appreciated.

 

[Fents]

get a whole bunch of old empty coke bottles and cut the bottom of them then stick them in they ground (cap end into the ground) then fill them with water just before they leave, sort of like a manual drip system...will work for a bit just not to sure how long.

 

[antains]

I've got all my hops at my parents place and they are heading to perth for four weeks. I might be able to get someone to drop in halfway through their trip but otherwise they are very much out of everyone's way, including me (300km round trip). Has anyone got any ideas how to keep them alive whilst the weather is warm? Can't use a drip system as the water will be turned off in case of a problem. Will they last two weeks without water and will soaking them kill them?? Any help appreciated.

Swifty,
I haven't grown hops, yet, but I would look at using some soil wetter and then topping it with mulch.

Off the top of my head, I wonder if you can fabricate a stand-alone drip system by lining some of those plastic spears from Bunnings with a material to slow down water leakage. Then fill up a 2-litre (or bigger) soft drink bottle with water, tape the spear to it and drive the spear into the ground.

It may not last 4 weeks, but it should last more than 1...

Ant.

Edit: In the meantime, Fents replied.

 

[PostModern]

Don't mess about with a few coke bottles. Rig up a fermenter full of water to a hose to one of those spike irrigation things, suitably slowed with ag cloth, or even put a twist tap on the hose itself, or a crimp or something to severely restrict flow. If there's a week or so to go, they could test the speed quite quickly.

 

[drsmurto]

Without water they won't survive so take one of the above options.

300km round trip? If you knew how good home-grown hops are you would be driving there personally every 2nd day.

 

[MarkBastard]

That's what I was thinking PM. Something like a cube or fermenter that holds a decent amount of water, along with a way to restrict the flow.

 

[Nick JD]

RAINDANCE!

 

[dans6401]

How about something like this?


Obviously i'd use the largest thing i could to hold water, and turn the water drippers down as low as possible.

 

[Swifty]

Great idea's, the sprinklers set to lowest possible may just work and luckily I have about 5 or 6 weeks to test it. There are eight plants though so will have to try and find the largest water container possible.

Dr, looking forward to the fresh hops but as this is their first year in the ground I only have two out of the eight plants flowering and with a 12 week old daughter don't get the time to go making round trips like that. With the price of petrol I could buy a lot of hops.

 

[chillihilli]

Great idea's, the sprinklers set to lowest possible may just work and luckily I have about 5 or 6 weeks to test it. There are eight plants though so will have to try and find the largest water container possible.

Dr, looking forward to the fresh hops but as this is their first year in the ground I only have two out of the eight plants flowering and with a 12 week old daughter don't get the time to go making round trips like that. With the price of petrol I could buy a lot of hops.

I've just landscaped my place and here's some thoughts:
- Dripper lines have a measured drip rate per hole in litres per minute and a certain amount of holes per metre. From that, you can calculate how much water you will use over the period and therefore the size of the vessel required.
- I would put one ring of drippers around each plant, and buy yourself a bag of saturaid and dig it in around the base of the plants.
- A thick layer (6") of sugar cane mulch on top of the drippers will hold the moisture in
- If you want to get real fancy, you could use a battery powered tap timer, but they may not work with only gravity pressure and you would have to fart around with connections from the vessel.
- You can buy pond pumps and water pumps cheap as crap these days to move water around.
- Those black adjustable dial sprinkler fittings have a habit of getting clagged up or salty without pressure and are not reliable (I use them in my Hydroponic Tomato system but am moving away from them).
- Thing outside the box when it comes to a vessel. There's lots of things that hold water - Esky's, Wheelie Bins, old kegs, Kiddie Pools, Garbage bins, storage containers etc.

Definitely go the mulch and saturaid, but the easiest solution would be to get someone (a neighbour) to water them a couple of times per week. If you do rig up a vessel, you could easily ask someone to top it up for you once a week.

 

[Swifty]

The other thing I forgot to mention is that they are in pots.
I will look into the gravity fed dripper system, with saturaid and mulch.
What about sitting the pots in a tray of water, that will rot them like over watering won't it?

 

[lochrockingbeers]

They won't survive long in pots without rain. If you can't use an automated watering system, I'd go with the wheelie bin full of water connected to some kind of gravity fed drip system. Worth a try - people keep another related plant species going with this sort of system for a whole summer. It will take some experimenting so that the drippers drip very slowly and don't drain the bin quickly. I'd suggest a few drippers spaced evenly per pot. If they do get a bit fried they may come back from the rhizome if watered again, but you wouldn't want to leave it too long between drinks.

The other thing I forgot to mention is that they are in pots.
I will look into the gravity fed dripper system, with saturaid and mulch.
What about sitting the pots in a tray of water, that will rot them like over watering won't it?

 

[dans6401]

I did see a pot watering system at bunnings a little while a go. It consisted of a battery powered digital timer that you mount on the side of a bucket full of water. A small pump sits inside the bucket, and sends water up to a manifold which then branches out to ten 4mm hoses at the end of which you have drippers. I think they were about $60. Might be worth checking out.
I've found the adjustable dial drippers fine but as chillihilli pointed out they are no good for hydroponics as the nuturients you add leads to salt deposits and can clog them up.
As for sitting them in a tray of water it's alright as long as it's not too deep but it wont very last long. Hops are pretty thirsty and the rest will soon disappear by evaporation.

 

[OzMick]

I had to leave mine unattended for a fortnight over Christmas. Get a battery powered timer to go on a tap in the backyard, and hook that up to a dripper system. Worked like a charm, and have continued to use the very same rig even since arriving home for the veggies. Takes a lot of the headache out of forgetting to water the plants and remembering a day later to find them all thrashed from a couple of back to back hot days...

 

[chillihilli]

The other thing I forgot to mention is that they are in pots.
I will look into the gravity fed dripper system, with saturaid and mulch.
What about sitting the pots in a tray of water, that will rot them like over watering won't it?

Not to put to fine point on it, but if they are in pots, why don't you take them with you?

We bought these awesome self watering pots this year which hold about 25L of potting mix. I kept my tomatoes in them this summer, but I did still need to water them a lot (tomatoes are thirsty buggers).

Mulching pots makes a huge difference, but pots just don't hold enough water. Especially in the hot as crap weather in WA at the moment.

And a water tray will help, but will still dry out pretty quick.

 

[MarkBastard]

Not to put to fine point on it, but if they are in pots, why don't you take them with you?

You ever seen hops before???

 

[Swifty]

There's eight pots with over 8 foot of vines (bines) on them, taking them isn't a possibility. Also, can't hook up to the tap as the water gets turned off as it's in the bush and they don't want the pump to turn on accidently and waste all their water. Gravity fed dripper is looking to be the only option. Just need to sort a container big enough.

 

[drsmurto]

There's eight pots with over 8 foot of vines (bines) on them, taking them isn't a possibility. Also, can't hook up to the tap as the water gets turned off as it's in the bush and they don't want the pump to turn on accidently and waste all their water. Gravity fed dripper is looking to be the only option. Just need to sort a container big enough.

If they are worried about the pump turning on they are either paranoid or the pump is crap.

I leave my pump on. If no tap is open nothing happens.

 

[tommygun]

I'd go with the pump. agree with you dr. I have seen plenty of pumps turned on all the time with just taps on them or with small and large automated irrigation systems and it doesn't stress the motor of have problems.

If you run the drip off gravity feed you dont get the pressure and your 2lt an Hr drip isn't that at all. you may find some will drip some may not especially when the water gets low.

The shrubblers dripper that someone posted a pic of work great in pots but at full pressure with the drip turned up enough to reach most of the pot. I've used these for heaps of outdoor large nursery stock. They only need to be turned on for 2mins once a day. These sorts of systems are easy to setup quickly.


Just make sure you get a timer with some new batteries and all will be good for ages.

Shouldn't cost too much and you may find its better than having to worry about hand watering all the time.

Thomas

 

[chillihilli]

Nope I haven't seen hops before.. I'm amazed if they are that big that they surivive in pots at all.

The other thing you can get here in Melbourne is a 1 cubic metre water container (1000L) delivered. Not sure if that's an option for you.