allynlyon
Well-Known Member
I have thrown around some ideas with my husband about starting a hop farm here in Indiana. Unfortunately, I don't already live on land where I could start this. I've not looked at farm land before but I'm told it's at a relatively high market price right now. I also want to do some experimenting, reading, and money saving before I jump in. I figure I don't want to run into position where I have to cut corners so I want to know I have efficient start-up funds. I digress...
I still love growing hops, and I wanted to start this little venture. I embarked on an experiment to grow as many hops as I can in the space we have. So I plotted and planned for the past few weeks and sent Great Lake Hops several emails (by the way they are awesome). I ended up building 2 -25x5 raised beds, a 5x10 ft bed and prepped the soil around our house. I opted to order crowns from Great Lakes Hops and thought I would take you along on the process. I now have 32 hop plants planted (ones I just ordered and ones I planted last year.) I planted several different varieties to get an idea of how the different varieties responded to the soil here in addition to the weather.
I built the raised beds first but then I opted to order 6 yards of compost. If you aren't aware that is a lot of dirt to move so I recruited the neighborhood kids to help. I paid them with a trip to the local frozen yogurt shop.
I've seen a lot of people ask about buying crowns and ask specifically about buying from Great Lakes Hops. I was extremely impressed. My crowns came well packaged. You can see in the picture. You can also see that the crowns are huge. All of the plants look very healthy and I'm very happy.
Lastly, I got up on Saturday and planted all of my babies. I included a picture of one the 25x5 beds. It rained all weekend, I hope they enjoy the bath. I'm a little worried about the amount of water they got but hopefully they will drain nicely. I'll keep you updated as time passes.
I still love growing hops, and I wanted to start this little venture. I embarked on an experiment to grow as many hops as I can in the space we have. So I plotted and planned for the past few weeks and sent Great Lake Hops several emails (by the way they are awesome). I ended up building 2 -25x5 raised beds, a 5x10 ft bed and prepped the soil around our house. I opted to order crowns from Great Lakes Hops and thought I would take you along on the process. I now have 32 hop plants planted (ones I just ordered and ones I planted last year.) I planted several different varieties to get an idea of how the different varieties responded to the soil here in addition to the weather.
I built the raised beds first but then I opted to order 6 yards of compost. If you aren't aware that is a lot of dirt to move so I recruited the neighborhood kids to help. I paid them with a trip to the local frozen yogurt shop.
I've seen a lot of people ask about buying crowns and ask specifically about buying from Great Lakes Hops. I was extremely impressed. My crowns came well packaged. You can see in the picture. You can also see that the crowns are huge. All of the plants look very healthy and I'm very happy.
Lastly, I got up on Saturday and planted all of my babies. I included a picture of one the 25x5 beds. It rained all weekend, I hope they enjoy the bath. I'm a little worried about the amount of water they got but hopefully they will drain nicely. I'll keep you updated as time passes.
