I have no idea how they got in there, but I spent about 3 hours today disassembling the pump, cleaning everything, and blowing out the drain hose. So yep, don't put hops in your dishwasher! Some other interesting finds were about a dozen whole coffe beans and a whole olive. I'm pretty sure I must have put something in there while drinking, but I can't really figure out what sort of drunk munchies are satisfied by olives, coffee beans and whole hops. I'm sure it was a good idea at the time.