Whole hops to bag or not to bag

Brewing tommorw using whole hops I grew. Using cascade pellets for battering but plan on using 2.5 ounces of whole leaf later int the boil. My question is, am I better to throw them straight into the kettle(dumping through a funnell into a carboy) or put them in a paint strainer bag. I usually don't use bags, although I have never used whole hops before. Thanks

I brewed up a batch of Columbus-cascade IPA on Tuesday night using 10 oz of wet hops. I used my hop spider for them.

either way will work, so bag/no bag is your choice. whole hops filter out very easily so usually i don't bother with the bag. does your funnel have a filter? if so, use it to stop the hops during transfer to your fermenter. it'll get clogged once or twice - just stop pouring, spoon or dump out the used hops, and resume. you can also not worry about it and just add them to the fermenter, they will sink to the bottom and become part of the trub.

I find bagging whole hops a lot easier. You can just toss in pellets, since they sink to form part of the trub...leaf hops do not. But I prefer to bag all hops regardless of their form. It's just easier and reduces clean-up & frustration. The only time I go against this rule is the dryhop... I just toss the hops in and rack the beer on top of the dryhops. It's tough to get a swollen bag out of the neck of a carboy. And when you're racking, the bobbing bag just stirs things up and becomes a hassle. Better to wrap your racking cane with another mesh bag and siphon carefully than to dryhop in a bag.