Hermaphrodite Hop Plants

Does anyone have any information on what I think is a hermaphrodite hop plant I have?

I was just out harvesting the 1st year chinooks and found 2 seed pod clusters in the top 3 feet of the plant. No other plants have them only that one.

I am assuming the plant needs to be destroyed and unless I find other info thats what I plan to do with it.

Yep. It can happen. Hops can just decide to change sex. Usually has something to do with stress. And there is no way to change them back artificially. So, you can either wait and see or, rip it our now before it pollenates the females.

wait, is it a hermaphrodite or is it a male?

Occasionally a boy will slip into the mix and you get a bad rhizome. If this is all boy and shows no sign of cones, get rid of the whole plant.

If it is a hermaphrodite, meaning its showing both cones and these flowers, its a slightly different story. It is my understanding that when the plant is stressed, it will sometime start popping out the boys. I also understand that these are usually sterile, but I wouldn't count on it.

If this is a first year plant, you may want to yank it out. If this is an older plant, you may want to snip off the boys and see what it does next year.

GVH_Dan said:

wait, is it a hermaphrodite or is it a male?

Occasionally a boy will slip into the mix and you get a bad rhizome. If this is all boy and shows no sign of cones, get rid of the whole plant.

If it is a hermaphrodite, meaning its showing both cones and these flowers, its a slightly different story. It is my understanding that when the plant is stressed, it will sometime start popping out the boys. I also understand that these are usually sterile, but I wouldn't count on it.

If this is a first year plant, you may want to yank it out. If this is an older plant, you may want to snip off the boys and see what it does next year.

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Definately Hermaphrodite - got a lot of cones off of it.

GVH_Dan said:

usually sterile, but I wouldn't count on it.

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Yep. I had one. Nugget, IIRC, half cones, half boy bits. Damned thing even pollenated itself.

as far as i know, any seeds that are formed should be sterile. certain varieties i've grown (bullion, some on the cascades and the zeus is about half male) have been putting out male bloom for years. i've had no seedlings until i obtained a REAL male. any seedlings you see the following spring can be yanked out very easily if you're so inclined. i kinda like having a male in the garden to let nature be a little more at ease. hop on!

The male flowers (seed pods) in your picture have not opened yet and the female flower (cone) in the picture is past the stage where it could be pollinated and produce seeds. The female flower is ready to be pollinated during the "burring" stage when it has the hairs protruding. If you have male flowers opening up then anywhere in your hopyard (depending on wind direction, but you'll have seeds trust me ) you'll have seeded cones. I can't remember the proper names for the flower anatomy but I hope my description will suffice.

I have four plants in my yard that have produced male flowers in minimal numbers just like what you have photographed from time to time. I always tugged them off but the more I think about it I probably didn't have to due to the timing of the opening of the different genders. I know I missed some and have never, never had seeded cones on any of my nine plants. I left them behind at the old house for this season and have only been back to check on them 2-3 times a week but haven't noticed any males this year but I haven't checked as close as when I lived there. If you have other plants in the "burr" stage I'd meticulously pull every cluster of male flowers I could find but if this is your only plant and the cones are all maturing at the same pace I'd RDWHAHB.

This is only my advice, given from my own limited (8 years, 12 total plants) growing and brewing with seeded commercial hop experience.

Edit: You'll still end up with hops suitable for brewing and true to variety from this plant. If by some miracle seeds are produced and fall during harvest you may end up with some unknown plants sprouting but there's really nothing to do about it. The lb. of Amarillo I bought last fall from Hopsdirect was all seeded and other than a bit of a nutty taste that it seems that only I can detect they have brewed beers as normal.

I have a two-year old Cascade plant that is now showing hundreds of male flower clusters and buds at the top of the vine, but also hundreds of perfectly good cones, which I'm now harvesting. I wondered what they were until seeing the picture at the head of this thread. A new generation of burs is now coming along on the plant, so I think I'll have to go up and cut off all the male flower and bud clusters.

tedandlea said:

A new generation of burs is now coming along on the plant, so I think I'll have to go up and cut off all the male flower and bud clusters.

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why would you do that?

B-Hoppy said:

why would you do that?

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Well, I am thinking that the male flowers would pollinate the new female burs, thus producing seed and making the resulting cones useless. But maybe this is faulty reasoning. Maybe it might be OK to just let the male flower clusters be.

I have bought hole hops that had seeds in them. They worded just fine.

i still don't understand why you think the seeded hops would be 'useless'. certain lots of hops i buy have tons of seeds(from time to time) and the beers still turn out fine. i know some types of heat exchangers can become plugged with hop seeds but otherwise i don't think you'll have any adverse results by using them in your brew.

B-Hoppy said:

i still don't understand why you think the seeded hops would be 'useless'. certain lots of hops i buy have tons of seeds(from time to time) and the beers still turn out fine. i know some types of heat exchangers can become plugged with hop seeds but otherwise i don't think you'll have any adverse results by using them in your brew.

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The debate is long lived. Sensory analysis have resulted in a high occurence of tannic like flavors in beers where seedy hops were used. But true scientific analysis find nothing to support the claims.

The worst science has come up with is the seeds add weight.

GilaMinumBeer said:

Sensory analysis have resulted in a high occurence of tannic like flavors in beers where seedy hops were used.

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i don't have very good taste buds, so i guess i'm lucky. gonna go have another beer and let you all hash this one out. adios!

B-Hoppy said:

i don't have very good taste buds, so i guess i'm lucky. gonna go have another beer and let you all hash this one out. adios!

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I am just saying, there are reports on the interwebs that support the perception that seeds do cause subjective off flavors in beers.

I think seeds are an important consideration if you're pelletizing hops and are putting your hops out there for commercial sale. ...but for home use, people have been using seeded hops for centuries ...

I found this information from a hop farm in the UK:

"Seedless hops are grown without male plants and are in burr for longer, which makes them more susceptible to disease ... international brewers insist that the presence of seed is undesirable (usually with no explanation) ... There is no experimental evidence to support these objections but the hop trade outside the UK continues to promote derogatory information about seeded hops."

Original page: http://www.charlesfaram.co.uk/NewsSummer2002.htm

Now I'm not taking everything he says as gold but it is an other side to the arguement. I think one for non-commercial use should try NOT to have seeds but if you get a few - they are not 'useless'.

I wanted to revisit this thread. I've got a first year Zeus and it looks just like the picture that started this thread. It has to be a hermaphrodite. So I'm a home grower, never will be commercial. I use whole leafs when I brew. I have a numerous hop varieties very close to this one.

Do I destroy this plant?

Just snip the cojones?

I just found them and part of me wants to act this second, and another part of me wants to wait for the advice of my peers.

All thoughts are appreciated.

I'm trapped in a moment of indecisiveness.

B-Hoppy said:

as far as i know, any seeds that are formed should be sterile. certain varieties i've grown (bullion, some on the cascades and the zeus is about half male) have been putting out male bloom for years. i've had no seedlings until i obtained a REAL male. any seedlings you see the following spring can be yanked out very easily if you're so inclined. i kinda like having a male in the garden to let nature be a little more at ease. hop on!

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I'm re=reading this thread and noticed you listed Zeus. My 'hermy' is Zeus. Should I try clipping it's cojones? Or should I tear it out? The plant is so strong and the cones are huge for a first year. The cojones are pretty large to. Sigh....

Retrofit said:

I'm re=reading this thread and noticed you listed Zeus. My 'hermy' is Zeus. Should I try clipping it's cojones? Or should I tear it out? The plant is so strong and the cones are huge for a first year. The cojones are pretty large to. Sigh....

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probably not the one you want to ask this question of. the Z i have ends up about half and half. never seen anything like it (only been growing it for 3 yrs). i've seen this before on other varieties but this is out of control. i just let it do it's thing as it's a part of nature. probably not a good variety to grow in NE ohio if i was a commercial hop grower, but i'm not. just someone who likes plants. i'll probably move it out of the main hop yard and use it to help obscure the view of the neighbors that may move in soon. if they're cool, i can always dig her up and relocate. again, even if the boy portion of the plant works properly (doubtful), you can always simply remove any seedlings that MAY come up next year and all is good. if you don't like the seeds that it may or may not produce, take a shovel and dig it up and burn it. it's not that complicated. don't give up, there's a lot of other varieties to try. hop on!

Did you name the plant Jamie Lee?

no. i named it PAT!

Nice to both name suggestions, the wife hates the Jamie Lee "rumor" so maybe I should go there and rename my plant. Right now, I'm calling mine Hermy. I gotta go out of town, so I'm going to think about it before I burn it. I tried a hop cone and I've never had Zeus before, but I thought it was good.

I popped a cone in my mouth and my wife saw me from across the yard and said, 'What are you doing?" I said, "Putting lady bits in my mouth!" She laughed and said, "Lucky girl."

HAHAHA!

You could have told her you were testing the theory that hops killed dogs.

Retrofit said:

I wanted to revisit this thread. I've got a first year Zeus and it looks just like the picture that started this thread. It has to be a hermaphrodite. So I'm a home grower, never will be commercial. I use whole leafs when I brew. I have a numerous hop varieties very close to this one.

Do I destroy this plant?

Just snip the cojones?

I just found them and part of me wants to act this second, and another part of me wants to wait for the advice of my peers.

All thoughts are appreciated.

I'm trapped in a moment of indecisiveness.

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Where did you get Zeus? I thought it was proprietary

King of Cascade said:

Where did you get Zeus? I thought it was proprietary

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Freshops. Had it at one time.

Two problems with seeded cones: They reduce the amount of energy and nutrients that go into the production of resin and oils and since they are dead weight, they throw off your numbers for hop additions. Not that big a deal for home-grown. You'll be guessing at the AA% anyway and you can always dry hop.

I'd just leave the plants alone.

Thanks for the tips. I think I'm going to keep this plant around for now. I'll 'clip' it's boy parts, harvest the huge hop cones and move it next year into seclusion.

Appreciate all the comments.

Edit: I did get it from Freshops. Woof!