Progression of Hops Over a Growing Season (Pictures)

When I first started growing hops, I had hundreds of questions. What the use as fertilizer? When to plant? When are they ready to harvest? Etc., etc., etc.

Because of this, I've decided to post pictures and information on what I did throughout my growing season. These are a group of first year hops that I added to my garden this year. I wanted to stick with first year hops because that's when people have the most questions.

This is by no means a blog on what you HAVE to do, it's just what I have done that has worked well.

I will start by saying, I buy all my hops from Freshops.com and have never been disappointed.

I ordered my hops in March this year. That's a little early, but smart if you want to get the varieties you want. They sell out fast, so get them while you can. I bought rhizomes of Cascade, Mt. Hood, and Nugget. All three were around 4 dollars.

I recieved them a few weeks later, WAY before the growing season in Northern Illinois begins. I needed to store them for a few months, so I wrapped them in a paper towel while they were still moist and put them in the fridge. Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of the rhizomes, or how I planted them.

I planted my hops on April 24th this year. Here's a picture of how your mounds should look. (Keep in mind these are planted a little closer than they should be since they are different varieties. I would plant at least 5 feet apart.) To plant them, I mixed about 1lb. of manure into each hole. I dug about 36" down to get a good mixure into the soil around the rhizome. These things will suck up tons of nutrients, so you want to make sure you fertilize them well at the start. The hop should be burried vertically (some people use horizontally, but I've had better luck my way) 1" below the soil. Making mounds around them helps with water drainage.



This next picture was taken on 5-05, a little less than two weeks after planting.



The next few pictures are how they progressed over the period between 5-05 and 7-08. I would have posted more pictures of this, but I'm limited to 10 and I'm two lazy to do a double blog.





Keep in mind you want to train them (if they don't do it on their own) to go clockwise.



As you can see, the bines have reached their limit in height, so they've started to become more bushy. You will notice that eventually some of your lower leaves will begin to turn yellow and die. This is because your plant is using all the nutrients it can up top to create hops. The second year, you should trim the bottom 3' to allow better air circulation around the base and prevent diseases. My trellis is only around 12' high because most first years won't do this well, but I would advice going 15'+ if possible. Just incase.



About a week after that last picture I started getting burrs on the off shoots of the main bine. Once again, I can't fit the pictures. As soon as I started seeing burrs, I added a final sprinkling of vegetable fertilizer around the base of the hops. Take care not to let it touch the leaves. This will help the hops as they start to grow.

This next one is what your hops will look like as they're shifting from burrs to cones. This was taken on 7-29.



You will notice those stringy things starting to dry up and fall off after the cones start to become fully formed. This is a sign to start watching them daily for readiness. Mine took about 2-3 weeks to get to the point at which I could pick them. This next picture is on 8-11.



I just harvested tonight, so here's the final product of your season long labor. This is about 3-4lbs. of fresh homegrown hops drying. I use screens and set them out of direct sunlight for about 2-3 days or until they're brittle. Not too brittle though. You don't want them to break apart in your hands.



One final picture I want to show people is a picture of what your hop will look like when it's ready to be harvested. This is one of the biggest questions people ask. On top of them being papery (which is hard to show in a picture) and starting to turn brown, the lupelin(sp?) inside will be a bright yellow. Pull the hop apart and this is what you should see.




If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.