How many is too many?

I planted a Centennial rhizome not quite two weeks ago. Right now 16 sprouts have broke ground and still counting. How many is too many? Should I just let them grow being the first year? Should I let the 3-4 longest grow and nip the rest? TIA

The conventional wisdom for young plants is to pick the most robust looking 3 or 4 shoots to train up a couple of strings, and nip the rest. This is what I did on my 15 1st year plants last season and they did very well indeed (I got a couple of pounds of dried cones from them) so I'd go with the CW...

Cheers!

I heard it a bit differently. I understood that a first year plant is all about growing root mass. The more above ground plant, the more below was how I heard it. I let my first year plants grow, and just trained multiple bines up the lines. They did well.

ThreeDogsNE said:

I heard it a bit differently. I understood that a first year plant is all about growing root mass. The more above ground plant, the more below was how I heard it. I let my first year plants grow, and just trained multiple bines up the lines. They did well.

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That is what I am doing does anyone else have opinions on this? I had read as well it was better to just leave them alone the first year.

I have first year plants as well, I only had 2 bines grow out of each rhizome however (maybe because they're in buckets?). I'm letting them do whatever they want basically, just providing them with something to grow up. One of my centennials is about 6 feet tall now

I let my first years go crazy. 16 shoots is really crazy lol. as mentioned, the idea is to push root growth and not bine growth. You should get some cone production, but next year will be where its at.

Commercial growers get around 80% out of first-year plants, so the root idea is valid, but not the biggest factor. They generally have 4 bines per plant, even the first year.

I have pretty much left all my plants alone... I have 6 1st year crowns and 4 rhizomes. My cascades are over 12' tall and my Chinook is even taller as they have both reached the top of my trellis. I already have cones forming on the Cascades & Chinook. I have others that have numerous shoots but nothing substantial is growing very tall. I'm just letting everything do its thing this year. I have been using a 3-4-3 fertilizer and organic liquid nitrogen.

Thanks all. As of this morning, it's up to 17 sprouts. You would think that cutting them down to 6-8 shoots would still be a good balance of the "to cut or not to cut" debate, right?

If I had 17 I would probably just pick the strongest 6 to 8 and roll with that. They will still produce leaves to fuel the root system on their great journey up the vine.

This is only my first year growing hops but I've also heard that you should let the first year go crazy. but with 16 sprouts, maybe your plant is really big already.

How big is the rhizome, or is it a crown?

I planted mines about 3 or 4 weeks ago and there's only about 3 sprouts each.

Another reason you might let it go crazy is because you planted them so late. I think they might not have enough time to grow hop cones anyways.

When will hops shut down as far as vertical growth? I've heard around early July they kinda transition to cone product, and side arm growth.