I Need a Little Help on Hop Placement & Logistics

Last year, I planted 4 rhizomes...on the north side of my property, on a trellis that's in partial shade. Obviously, not much happened. They got big enough to climb the trellis, but the partial shade prevented much else.

This year, I'm planning on getting better results. We have a vegetable garden on the south wall of our house which gets full sun. I was thinking that I'd plant the rhizomes at the outer edge of the garden (which is about 4' from the house), attach one end of the twine to the ground, and attach the other end to the gable-end rake of the house, which is about 15-18' above ground level...thus creating a diagonal (probably 70º) line for them to run up.

Here's my question: I ordered 4 new rhizomes the other day from Midwest. Should I plant these new rhizomes in the new location, and leave the old ones where they are? Or should I move the old ones over to the new sunny location too? Will digging up the existing ones and replanting them lessen their success this year?

I'm no expert, but I think you will have better results all the way around if you move them all to the south side garden. Hops like sun. Partial shade is going to mean they aren't going to flower as much.

Evan!
I have done the exact same thing as you back when I started growing, hops.
The bine would grow nice and long but I never got any buds. It was on the north side.
I moved it to the south side. Problem solved. Will it lessen their success this year? Sounds like you're not getting any hops now so this shouldn't be a concern, really.

They like sun.

The first year you might not get any flowers anyway. That said, Hops prefer full sun, and plenty of water in a well drained area.

great, thanks for the answers. I'll move them all. Thanks!

My guess would be that you'd have better success by transplanting your old ones than you would with the new ones. The old ones would have developed their root system a little over the course of their first year even thought they didn't have ideal growing conditions. The reason why they say first year rizhomes won't yield much (or at all) the first year as they just started from a tiny root instead of an established larger root system. When you dig them up I bet the roots will be huge compiared to your new rizhomes.