Hop Transplant (pot to ground)

[WBB]

My hops are getting to tall for my pots so I want to get them into the ground with a trellis system. I cleared out about a 10x10 area that gets about 5/6 hours of sun a day. Only problem is I put down halts crabgrass preventer on the lawn back in early April, including the area that I took up the grass. According to Scott’s, I shouldn’t grow anything for at least a year, anything edible.

But I’m thinking if I dig down a few inches and then build a cedar box about 10-12 inches tall on all sides and fill with a crap ton load of fresh soil, that should be good, no? So I would essentially have about 12-14 inches of fresh soil that the hops would be transplanted into.

Thoughts? Should I be concerned with the safety of the cones at the end of the growing season? Meaning would they be safe to use for brewing? Do you think the hop plants would ingest some of the halts?

 

[RyanWeary]

I'm admittedly a rookie in hops growing, but they're very hearty plants and they take in a vast majority of their nutrients within the top 6" of soil. I'd venture an educated guess that your plan will work.

 

[Leezer]

I’m a rookie too, and can’t say for sure about the safety question, but last year I dug a trench around my plants to do some root management. I only dug down about 8 to 10 inches and it seemed like most of the roots were exposed at that depth.

 

[WBB]

I ended up getting some cedar boxes and taking up the grass and going down an inch or two (lot of rocks and clay). I then put fresh top soil down and then put down some weed blocker. Then put the cedar boxes on top of the weed blocker and filled each box with about 10cf of raised bed soil and native soil. So it’s about 7 inches or so above the weed blocker.

Theses are first year plants, so I don’t think the root system will be that big as to try to get below the weed blocker.

Will take a pic when all is said and down. Next I have to string up the twine and transplant.