Some Info Re The Effect Of Latitude When Growing Hops

[billvelek]

snip ... Also, worth considering is plant spacing.

Yes, that could explain PART of the disparity, but hardly very much of an '8 times' factor. As I undertand it, in the U.S., commercial growers have 900 plants per acre; 1 acre = .405 hectares, so that's at the rate of 2,222 plants per hectare. In the U.S., commercial production varies from 725.7kg to 907.2kg per acre = 1,793kg to 2,242kg per hectare. Are your growers really reaping eight times as much as that???

I've done some extensive reading about hop farming lately; why haven't I heard of this PHENOMENAL growth in Australia before this? I'm baffled. This would absolutely disprove all theories about latitude and vernalization, and make the vast bulk of what I've read completely false. Is someone pulling my leg here? (That's "Yankee" for 'joking' = 'bullshit'.)

Cheers.

Bill Velek

 

[lochrockingbeers]

Yes, that could explain PART of the disparity, but hardly very much of an '8 times' factor. As I undertand it, in the U.S., commercial growers have 900 plants per acre; 1 acre = .405 hectares, so that's at the rate of 2,222 plants per hectare. In the U.S., commercial production varies from 725.7kg to 907.2kg per acre = 1,793kg to 2,242kg per hectare. Are your growers really reaping eight times as much as that???

I've done some extensive reading about hop farming lately; why haven't I heard of this PHENOMENAL growth in Australia before this? I'm baffled. This would absolutely disprove all theories about latitude and vernalization, and make the vast bulk of what I've read completely false. Is someone pulling my leg here? (That's "Yankee" for 'joking' = 'bullshit'.)

Cheers.

Bill Velek

Commercially, you have to think of yield per area, be it hectare or acre, rather than yield per plant, because area is your limiting factor and not necessarily number of plants. Plant thinning is a well studied scientific concept. Basically you reach a plant density where the more plants you put in the ground per unit of area achieves no increase in yield i.e. the yield plateaus. Essentially the plants compete with each other and the yield per plant drops but you have more plants. You can actually plant too many plants and the competition is so severe that yield will decrease. Bill, it is definitely possible that growers in Australia have a more economical/optimal plant spacing than growers in the US but this is pure speculation on my part. What you want commercially is a plant spacing that allows you to grow the highest yielding crop possible from the fewest plants possible. You must also consider harvesting, establishment and maintenance costs because the fewer plants per unit of area should translate to lower costs overall.

Sorry for another loosely related example, but in a previous job I worked in the eucalypt plantation industry in Australia. Most plantations were established with around 1000-1200 trees per hectare. However, research at the time was showing that they could achieve the same yield of wood per hectare if they planted half as many trees per hectare and possibly even less again, but save a lot on establishment and harvesting costs, plus have a crop of trees that used less water. I'm not sure what the current status is but I bet many plantations are still established at the old rate of 1000+ trees per hectare, because they don't believe the research.

From reading many of the posts on the hop growing newsgroup, I think many of the hobby USA growers are planting rhizomes too close together. Sounds like the recommendation to plant several rhizomes of the same variety in more or less the same area might have been made by some of the companies who sell rhizomes as a means to sell more rhizomes. Having 3-4 rhizomes of 1 variety planted in roughly the same spot is likely to lead to 3-4 smaller competing plants whereas 1 planted rhizome should grow to a much larger size.

Lochy

 

[PostModern]

So something like Suped up Pride of Ringwood and other high alpha varieties are seriously going for over $150 a kilo? What will this mean for the homebrewers' market: P.O.R. at $200-300 per kg! What does this also mean for the price of commercial beer?

I think he said per kilo of Alpha Acid, not per kilo of hop. This is one reason we're seeing so many acres planted with high alpha acid varieties and less with aroma hops.

 

[lochrockingbeers]

I think he said per kilo of Alpha Acid, not per kilo of hop. This is one reason we're seeing so many acres planted with high alpha acid varieties and less with aroma hops.

$1100 per kg of alpha acid was quoted so roughly add a zero to a variety's alpha acid reading and you get your price per kg of hops. So P.O.R. and other high alphas would fetch around $100-150 per kg depending on % acid. Either this is way out or hop prices are on the way up in a big way.

I'm wondering if $110 per kg of alpha might be more accurate.

 

[Lukes]

Sorta

This 32kg lot we got (Guru/AHB Bulk Buy) a few years back would be worth a bit now if it was the 2008 crop...............



Sorry NO more Bulk Buy......

- Luke :icon_cheers:

 

[billvelek]

I think he said per kilo of Alpha Acid, not per kilo of hop.

Actually, he said (or at least implied) both ... as follows ...

AU$1100 per kilo of alpha acid. For a 15% variety, $165 per kilo TO THE GROWERS.

... which I believe clearly means $165.00 per kilo of HOPS, and not alpha acid ($1,100/kilo for 100% AA) ... and then, in another post, he said ...

Just out of interest, each string of this season't Tassie high alpha varieties will be earning the hop growers $400+ That's $1200 per plant (three strings is the norm) at the farm gate.
Gives you an idea of a) Yield and B) the effect of the shortage.

So, given that 15% is high alpha acid (I can't recall ever seeing anything higher), and at a price of $165 per kilo, to have a PLANT worth $1,200 works out to 7.27 kilos.

Now, Lochy has raised the possibility that Australian growers might be using their land more efficiently, and he rightly discusses that there would naturally be an optimum number of plants per hectare and that overplanting would reduce yield. I have no problem with any of that. The reasons I was using per "plant" rather than per hectare is that 'mfdes' used the "$1200 per plant" figure, and also because as homebrewers/home-gardeners, I think we all probably think in terms of "per plant" rather than per hectare (or acre). I would also like to add that I'd imagine that U.S. farmers, as business men, are probably aware of advancing techniques in both Europe and other hop growing areas, and if Australia is able to achieve many times the yield for a given area, they would quickly adopt the same growing techniques. And the figure that I've used for crop yields in the U.S. are based both on government statistical records that I've seen, as well as virtually every article about growing hops that I've read so far. This thread is the first time I've ever heard of any claims of yields exceeding much more than a kilo per plant, and while I would be very impressed at a mere doubling of that yield due to better spacing, growing conditions, and techniques, etc., I am absolutely at the point of disbelief at any claims of increasing yield by a magnitude of EIGHT times. I think that we are just somehow miscommunicating. So, again, I ask ... how many kilos of dried hops are typically harvested from a hectare?

Finally, I hope that my persistence is not offensive to anyone. I don't mean to be argumentative; I'd just like to be sure that I understand what is being said.

Thanks.

Bill Velek

 

[lochrockingbeers]

Bill and others

Below are some Aus and NZ stats from a google search. Around 2-3 tonnes per ha seems about right. The tables pasted below are messy but check the web links for easier to follow tables.

Aussie data ( http://www.dpiw.tas.gov.au/inter.nsf/WebPa...IL-5HU8Q9?open)

Pasted below but difficult to follow.

91/92 96/97 97/98 98/99 99/00 00/01 01/02
Production
- Area covered (ha) 813 539 545 670
-Number of operators 8
- Direct employment (no.)
- Product quantity (tonnes) 1,250 1,495 1,489 1,225


NZ data (http://www.hortnet.co.nz/publications/science/breed.htm)

It doesn't paste so well but the yield in kg/ha is the first number under each variety so in the general range of 2-3 tonnes per ha.

Table 1:
Characteristics of New Zealand bred cultivars and selections : 6 year means

Cultivar
Yield
Alpha
Beta
Cohumulone
Oil


(kg/ha)
acids (%)
acids (%)
content (%)`
content (%)

Super Alpha
3060
13.7
8.5
38
1.47

Green Bullet
3090
13.6
7.2
42
1.18

Sticklebract
3210
14.1
7.6
45
1.26

Pacific Gem
3220
14.9
8.3
42
1.36

NZ Hallertauer
2590
9.5
7.7
37
0.92

Southern Cross
2730
14.1
7.0
28
1.24

Pacific Hallertauer
1950
6.0
7.2
27
1.32