Second year cascades

Last year, I bought 5 cascade rhizomes. I gave 2 to my brother. I planted mine in half wine barrels. He planted his in the ground, then transplanted them at his new place a few weeks ago. He already has 8"-10" plants, and mine haven't even sprouted yet. Today, I scratched around in the dirt to see if there was a sprout under there. What I found was that my rhizomes appeared to be rotten. There were no roots and they seemed to be soggy and broke apart. I think maybe I loved them too much...I've been watering them every few days. The top 1/2" of the soil was dry, but it was quite moist below that. Right now, I have the rhizomes sitting on top of the soil to dry out a little.

My question is, do you think I killed them, or will they be OK. The lady I bought them from is starting to sell them again, so if these are dead, I will go buy more right away.

If you didn't find any roots or new buds and they're soggy, I'd say it's time for some new ones. Did you continue to water through the Winter? How did they finish the year off last year? Sorry to hear.

They seemed to peter out early last year and did not produce any flowers. Once they were dry, I picked off the dried vines. I didn't water through the winter, except for rain.

I'm OK with getting new rhizomes...A little disappointed that I'm still a year away from decent production, more than that, I want to identify my mistake(s) and not repeat them.

So do you think you watered them too much? I just planted a cascade hop rhizome 2 days ago in a large 5 gal container. I watered it the day i planted it and today... not a lot of water but enough to penetrate the soil where I planted it. It does have a little stem sticking out of the dirt already. This is my 1st attempt at growing hops...

I'd have to think that it was probably a little too much water being that you couldn't find much but the remnants of soggy dead rhizomes. Ask your brother how big of a root system he had on his when he dug them up this Spring. Too much water is a big problem when they're just getting started because it's generally the first things folks do if they don't see any growth after a week or two, give them a drink. Ironically, that's probably the last thing you want to do because the water requirements for a newly planted rhizome are crazy less than what an actively growing 1 or 2 year old plant is. For one, the rhizome is not using much water at all, just enough to keep from drying out while establishing some roots and trying to put up some shoots. An actively growing plant can get rid of some excess water by sorta 'sweating' it out through it's leaves, rhizomes can't do that because they have no leaves. Better to keep them a little dryer than wetter as this naturally forces the plant to send roots deeper which will help in the long term health of the plant.

Sorry, got off on a little tangent there. Hope this helps.

Very interesting B-Hoppy! Thanks for the tips.

B-Hoppy: I e-mailed the lady I got my rhizomes from last year and hopefully will be getting 3 more next week.

My brother said he was amazed at how large the root system was on his plants. I was impressed that after he dug them up and had them in 2 gal pots for a week and half, they sprouted and grew so quick. That's what caused me to be concerned about mine.

I failed to mention in my initial post that late in the season last year, I dumped some spent grains in the planters. My thought was that the grains are a source of organic material for the soil/plants and would fertilize the plants. I have not heard or read anything to suggest that was a good or bad idea. Hopefully it wasn't a bad idea, because I also dumped some in the tomato planter and I'll be planting my tomatos next week as well.

What, if any, type of starter fertilizer do you recommend? I have some 16-16-16 general purpose fertilizer, plus some miracle grow, but I'll get whatever I need to make my hops happy...because hops make me happy!

Med-brewer: I have a 2.5 gallon watering can that I split between all three planters about every 2 days. My soil is sandy loam with pretty good drainage, and apparently it was too much. I know less about growing things than I do about brewing and I'm a fair brewer at best, so take it for what it's worth!

Sorry to rub it in 60SD. Here are to 2 plants that I transplanted a week and a half ago. These are from the same batch as yours. The first year I harvested about 12 oz. total and I looks like this year is going to be out of control. That is as long as I don’t end up in a lawsuit and have to take them out because some irresponsible dog owner let their dog eat my hops. Haa Anyhow if your hops are moldy and spongy I would be concerned with disease and bugs affecting the plant as well as the previously mentioned watering issue. I would buy a few more and then take the ones you have and stick em in the ground somewhere and forget about them. Who knows, they might grow.