Dark hairs on hop cones?

[SCHombrew]

I've harvested from my four surviving cascade and columbus hop plants several times now. Each time I've noticed dark hairs (similar to eyelashes) that grow and fall off of the cones. Being a first time grower I was worried about them being seeds, but I've now seen pics of seeds and that ain't it. What are they exactly? I'm not terribly worried since I've actually brewed w/ the Columbus and the brew turned out great; more curious than anything. I searched this forum and didn't really see anything about this ?. Tks and continue making awesome brew!



[edit] I know I'm truly lucky as both are first year plants and I've harvested nearly a pound (dried) of Cascade and nearly a half pound of Columbus. Yay healthy rhizomes!

 

[IrregularPulse]

pics?

 

[B-Hoppy]

if you remember back when the hops began to form you saw little 'burrs'. the dark hairs you are seeing now were the little structures (stigmas) that began as burrs. the whole situation is natural and harmless to your brewing.

 

[Randar]

I've harvested from my four surviving cascade and columbus hop plants several times now. Each time I've noticed dark hairs (similar to eyelashes) that grow and fall off of the cones. Being a first time grower I was worried about them being seeds, but I've now seen pics of seeds and that ain't it. What are they exactly? I'm not terribly worried since I've actually brewed w/ the Columbus and the brew turned out great; more curious than anything. I searched this forum and didn't really see anything about this ?. Tks and continue making awesome brew!

This is normal and it is not seeds. If you shake your bines you will get a shower of these.

This is what a seed looks like:

 

[SCHombrew]

Here's a pic of the 'hairs' that I cleaned off my counter-space after unloading them. They're in a small bowl and hopefully visible in the pic (it was taken w/ a cell phone).

Okay so someone explain how to upload pics into posts. The pic is in my gallery titled first year hops. After looking back to make sure the pic uploaded, I noticed the burs B-Hoppy was referring to. The hairs look exactly like these just smaller and darker so I'm guessing you're right on the money. Tks as always!