My first year growing hops

Are these ready to harvest?







These are my 1st year Willamette that took off like crazy. None of my other plants are even half the size.
I have a large screen ready to put all the hops on, should I run a fan or will just leaving them to air dry be ok?

They look close. Give a cone a flick with your finger. It should snap off, leaving a few petals on the stem. If the stem breaks, they are past their peak but still worth picking.

A fan speeds the drying time and that is critical to the long-term quality.

My first-year Willamettes did not produce cones, so I can't directly compare, but the edges look like they are peeling back, so that the cone is opening a little, which happens as they ripen. Also, I found the advice to wait until they were 'papery' to be good - the difference was noticeable with my first year Cacades.

My Cascades are bigger than your Willamettes, but I have no idea if that's related to ripening or just a difference in the hop variety. If you want to compare size, you can see a couple pictures of the cones after harvesting at http://www.singingboysbrewing.com/The-Blog.html?entry=first-hop-harvest and http://www.singingboysbrewing.com/The-Blog.html?entry=final-hop-harvest-2011

Thanks for the replies! I will monitor them daily at this point. It looks like the ones at the top will be done first and then it will be in waves. I hope it doesn't rain! We got dumped on for two weeks.

I dunno, they look like they could use more time on the bine. I'd at least pick a representative cone, split it lengthwise, crush it up between my hands and give the result a good deep sniff. It that smells like ripe hops, then I'd consider picking 'em...

Cheers!