Chinook or Columbus???

The labels on my Chinook and Columbus hops have worn away and I do not remember which is which. Is there any way to figure out by aroma or sight? One definitely has a more "piney" aroma.

Or should I just assign one plant to he Chinook and the other to be Columbus and move forward?

I really hate that I did this...

Thanks!

alers22 said:

Or should I just assign one plant to he Chinook and the other to be Columbus and move forward?

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No, these are very different hops and with only 2 plants, you should be able to tell them apart once the cones are mature. I don't have a CTZ (columbus) bine, but would be happy to post a picture of the Chinook cones when I get home.

I've got both...and they're both about ready to harvest. I'll see if I can get some pics for you. My CTZ is Zeus, but from what I understand it's the same as Columbus.

Here you go...hope this comes out ok. Of the 5 varieties I have, these two look the most alike. It looks like the chinook leaves are a bit more "wasp-waisted" than the zeus. The cones look very similar.

My chinook and goldings plants didn't do real well this year as you can see by the cone. My cascade, centennial and zeus just went crazy....tons of cones! Anyway, as for aroma, I do get a much sharper pine aroma from the chinook. I'm not the best when it comes to discerning subtle nuances in aroma and flavor, but I can definitely tell the difference in aroma between these two.

beowulf said:

My chinook and goldings plants didn't do real well this year as you can see by the cone. My cascade, centennial and zeus just went crazy....tons of cones! Anyway, as for aroma, I do get a much sharper pine aroma from the chinook. I'm not the best when it comes to discerning subtle nuances in aroma and flavor, but I can definitely tell the difference in aroma between these two.

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Funny, in the same city, my Goldings performed pretty well, and my Chinooks went nuts. My Centennials are pretty lame this year. I don't have a CTZ. Several other types, none doing much this year as 2nd and 3rd year plants..except the Chinooks and Goldings.

Most of the cones on my Chinooks are considerably longer than those pictured above. They do have that piney scent, which I don't get on the Glaciers, Perles, Northern Brewers, etc.

Are those young cones a real accurate representation of hop varietals?
Chinook should be elongated, and the CTZ should be tighter.

The chinook cones in my pictures are probably not a perfect example. I really didn't have any "full-size" chinook cones. This was the first year for all of my plants. The Zeus, Cascade, Centennial and Nugget (to a lesser extent) all produced much bigger cones. Even the Zeus in the picture is probably not as big as most of them...probably in the middle somewhere.

Thanks Beowulf this is exactly what I needed to see! Problem solved...finally. From now on Ill be using a label maker instead of Sharpie...

Good to hear that you figured it out ... but since I already took the picture, here are some of the different size cones on my Chinook.

My Chinooks look similar to nagmay's....I think they are fairly identifiable by the way their petals begin to lift straight our as they ripen. I just harvest a bunch of Zeus/Centennial last night and they don't do that...they remain more cone shaped.