Growing hops in VA

Im considering growing hops and i've been researching which would be the best types to grow around here. i figured i'd see if anyone has had any experience/advice they can give me about growing in this area. Im located in southern virginia in the hampton roads area.

Thanks

How long between frosts?

I think at that latitude you would be fine with most varieties.

ok i wasnt sure, as virginia's weather patterns are pretty unpredictable

We have a grow season here in MA of May 21-Oct 1st give or take a week. I have been able to gr0w Columbus, Cascade, and Centennial. How long between frosts for you? It will take a couple of grow cycles to see results so don't be dissapointed if it doesn't produce much the first or second year. I used about 5 gallons of compost per plant and a sprinkle of lime across the top to stabilize the Ph and I had good results my first year.

On average we have about 7 months between frosts.
april 4th - november 2nd

You should be good with most varieties. I am in TN about 30 min from the VA border. I have 11 varieities that I grow here and all of them do pretty well especially the nugget, chinook and brewers gold. I also get a true dual harvest as well. The plants start coming up on or about March 8 and are full of ripe cones by June 14. I then cut them back and let them go again and get another good harvest about mid sept.

Biggest issue you would have is not necessarily variety but the humidity and spider mites. The varieties youll want are those that have good resistance to powdery and downy mildew due to the high humidity in the area. Keep them sprayed with your choice of anti fungal sprays and if you dont have or havent noticed any lady bugs around...youll want plenty of those to help with Spider Mites during the hotter dryer parts of the season.

Jap beetles and Hop Merchants could also be an issue. If you see a hop merchant stop right then and start spraying with Bt or you will not have any hop plants at all. 2 hop merchants can easily strip a 16' plant of every leaf it has over night. While you will often read that Hop Merchants are not a problem in the PNW they are a real issue here in the south where we are in thier natural habitat zone.

Jap beetles are a passing nuisance. As long as you are not inundated with them by the thousands then they do little to a fair amount of dmg but only for a month +/- a week. All my plants (200+) had little to no dmg from them.

The clay soil in this area is also a bit of a concern -be prepared to lime pretty heavily based on the amount of clay in your soil. Now is a very good time to lime and let it set over the winter so that it can penetrate into the soil.


Cheers

I think the answer to the question, "I live in X, what is good to grow?"
Is always, "Grow what you will use."

If Australians and Alaskan's can grow hops, I think most people inbetween can make it work.

I'm in Williamsburg. I planted 6 cascades in late April or so. I went with Cascade just because they are said to be the the most versatile and hardiest. From all my research I wasn't expecting much yield in my first year. Five plants survived and yielded close to a pound a plant! Enough to brew an all fresh hop ale and then some. I harvested in August and September.

One recommendation, get a pick up and go to the Newport News compost facility. $20 and they fill up the back of your truck with 100% compost. Enough to fill a 4' X 16' raised bed I built. Didn't have to treat my soil all season and my hops seemed pretty happy.

Oh yeah and I kept my plants up after harvest. They just died back in the last few weeks.

If your curious about how the different varieites perform in this area (TN VA NC) I just finished posting my harvesting results for all my varieities except for the Cascades which were destroyed and will be replanted this year from fresh stock.

http://research.hopgardens.com/?page_id=154

Disclamer - individual results may vary

But its what I got from the 2010 season. I am still posting notes but with all the graphs its kind of easy to see the variability between varities.

Cheers

I am in Alexandria Virginia, and am interested in starting a HOP garden. Can any one recomend a good source for Hop Rhizomes ?

Did you end up growing hops? We live in Norfolk and we're thinking about buying some rhizomes.

Its a small world haha...I live in Gloucester just over the Coleman bridge by Yorktown. Its good to see so many hbt people close by. I ordered 3 cascades and 1 magnum to try to start this year... from what I've read so far we shouldn't have too many issues with most varieties.

I'm in Newport News. My 5 Cascade rhizomes went gangbusters last year. I'm hoping to expand my growing to Centennial, this year.

OK, looks like Cascade should do well then. I'll select something else but most of my small crop will be cascade.

kepling5001 said:

Its a small world haha...I live in Gloucester just over the Coleman bridge by Yorktown. Its good to see so many hbt people close by. I ordered 3 cascades and 1 magnum to try to start this year... from what I've read so far we shouldn't have too many issues with most varieties.

Click to expand...

Small world . . . Up in Montross I plan to grow the exact same set up. Do some bittering with the magnum, and throw the cascade liberally into just about everything!

Actually I'm looking into some centennial as well.

Another Virgina home brewer here, up near Fredericksburg. The link above says to check back between mid-march and June. Seems a bit late for our planting season. Any other sources?

I was thinking about starting with 5-6 plants, maybe 2-3 cascade, and then a second complimentary variety.

Alexandria, VA. Chinook and Cascade in large pots. . Cascade did far better.

Last year I thought I lost them during summer vacation coinciding with a heat wave. So I cut them back in sadness. They came back and produced almost a pound by October!

Lesson learned: don't neglect watering but they can be hardy bastards with the long VA grow season.

I just ordered 2 each of Centennial, Galena, and Willamette. Seems like a decent mix and all seem pretty hardy. The soil is variable on my land but the area I'll use has clay and rock, with some sand. It is well drained and slightly acidic with the quartzite being so abundant. I can add plenty of compost and mulch. My main concerns are wind and deer. I am going to put them inside the garden fence, so that will help with one problem. Hopefully the deer don't eat my pumpkins (outside the fence)...need those for the Autumn brews.

Glad to hear that the hops are tough plants and our VA growing season lends itself to good crops.

I live in Roanoke and am considering starting a raised bed hop garden this year with Cascade and Columbus. I am planning to have lattice on the more shady side of the beds. Approximately how high can I expect the plants to reach?

dhuggett said:

I live in Roanoke and am considering starting a raised bed hop garden this year with Cascade and Columbus. I am planning to have lattice on the more shady side of the beds. Approximately how high can I expect the plants to reach?

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I'm in central VA and grew Cascade, Centennial, Saaz and Nugget for the first time this past season. I built two, 8' tall vertical trellises about 15' apart and then connected the trellises up top using twine for the bines to run even further. I had one bine over 15' long! I expect they will grow even faster this spring on the second year! Cascade did really well, as did Nugget. I had full sun for about 8 hours a day. I fertilized 3 times and my soil is loamy, deep and pH of about 7.0.

dhuggett said:

I live in Roanoke and am considering starting a raised bed hop garden this year with Cascade and Columbus. I am planning to have lattice on the more shady side of the beds. Approximately how high can I expect the plants to reach?

Click to expand...

I'm in the Tidewater area of Virginia. I erected a 4x4 post in the center of an 8x8 bed. The post is 16' long, and buried ~3' deep, so that gave me a height of ~13'. I ran 1 bine straight up the post on a hemp rope and 4 more bines planted near the corners of the square bed, about 5' from the center, giving the hop bines about a 14' run. All 5 plants reached the top of the post in the first season, and in their second year, got there quicker. I think the Cascade plants would have gone further than 16' if I had a post that tall.

I just planted two each of Cascade and Zeus (CTZ) in a raised bed with loamy rich organic soil. I live in Roanoke in the Blue Ridge mtns.

Hopin' for the best!


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

I like the sounds of this. I live in Lynch Station. Small community south of Lynchburg and east of Roanoke. I've been considering planting a few hops and will more than likely prepare my soil this year for a bed next year.
My neighbor is a horticulturist and I plan to utilize his expertise in preparing the soil for the best possible result. I'm considering Cascade, Centennial, and either Magnum or CTZ.
It is good to hear of favorable results in this area.

I'm in Norfolk and have 5 Cascade and 5 Nugget that are already pretty bushy. I haven't had time to trim them back. The only problem I have had over the past six years is whatever I put in the ground (all are in large pots) dies off after it gets to about 5 feet. I am assuming the ground is too sandy and a raised bed or hole filled with better soil would prob do the trick. go for it.

rekoob said:

I'm in Norfolk and have 5 Cascade and 5 Nugget that are already pretty bushy. I haven't had time to trim them back. The only problem I have had over the past six years is whatever I put in the ground (all are in large pots) dies off after it gets to about 5 feet. I am assuming the ground is too sandy and a raised bed or hole filled with better soil would prob do the trick. go for it.

Click to expand...

You really have to keep them watered well in the summer and in our hot Virginia summers the bines prefer afternoon shade so they don't scorch!