Help! Hops buying/transfering

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Germelli1

Germelli1

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Someone is offerin their hops plants locally on craigslist. I have a few questions for you all.

If I dig these up and transfer them to my house would they be first year plants when they sprout next spring?

Would this be a better route than planting ryzomes next spring?

How much should I offer per plant?

Here are the pics from the ad:
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How much better they perform than rhizomes depends on how much root ball you transplant. The more energy the plant has put into growing or re-growing roots, the less yield you can expect. That said, Freshops has sold some root crowns from established plant on Ebay for $25 or so, IIRC, which are supposed to have enough stored energy in them to accomplish both root regrowth and decent yield the first year. I didn't buy them, so others may be able to speak to that.

The rhizomes that I got for $4-5 each were little more than twigs with root buds and bine buds. You can see from the first year bragging posts that some people still get significant yield from these; I am not so fortunate. There is another site http://www.highhops.net/buy.html that sells little plants in cone pots that were $15 earlier, now $10. I hope this helps.

Just as a reality check, permit me to remind you that they need to be a variety you like, or the are no bargain. I don't like grapefruit in my beer, and personally will not "waste" garden space on Cascades, though other folks here seem thrilled to grow them and use them. There is no disputing taste, but there is no use growing something that is not to your taste.
 
ThreeDogsNE said:
How much better they perform than rhizomes depends on how much root ball you transplant. The more energy the plant has put into growing or re-growing roots, the less yield you can expect. That said, Freshops has sold some root crowns from established plant on Ebay for $25 or so, IIRC, which are supposed to have enough stored energy in them to accomplish both root regrowth and decent yield the first year. I didn't buy them, so others may be able to speak to that.

The rhizomes that I got for $4-5 each were little more than twigs with root buds and bine buds. You can see from the first year bragging posts that some people still get significant yield from these; I am not so fortunate. There is another site http://www.highhops.net/buy.html that sells little plants in cone pots that were $15 earlier, now $10. I hope this helps.

Just as a reality check, permit me to remind you that they need to be a variety you like, or the are no bargain. I don't like grapefruit in my beer, and personally will not "waste" garden space on Cascades, though other folks here seem thrilled to grow them and use them. There is no disputing taste, but there is no use growing something that is not to your taste.
Click to expand...

Thank you so much for the reply. They are cascades which I don't like for flavor/aroma in most of my beers (there are a few exceptions) but I used them a lot for bittering. I am also going to be planting some rhizomes I like (willamette, etc) but I was planning on planting some cascades anyway. I have to dig them up and move them about 2 miles to my house so I should be able to keep the roots in soil the whole time.
 
it's hard to tell by the pictures but it looks like they're more than a year old. if you follow the vines back to where they come up out of the ground, you should see an area where the majority of them are concentrated. this is the main crown. try to get as much of the crown as possible(within reason). most likely there will be a bunch of rhizomes growing out from the crown. these will look like very LIGHT colored roots with little buds on them and will be located underground, very close to the soil surface. you can trim some of these off of the crown and use to propagate new plants if you like, and then just plant the crown. yes this will act like a more mature plant as opposed to a first year planting due to the reserves it has accumulated in the crown. i'd offer $10 - $15 per crown. if he bites, you're golden. if not, tell him to pound salt and plant some rhizomes next spring. you'll just have to wait another year for a bigger crop. hop to it!
 

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