Planting next spring: a few questions

[jfr1111]

I have a perfect south facing spot where I want to plant my hops next year. They'll be against the wooden posts that support my second level deck, so there's no worry about building anything. I'll just run some twine/wire down and voilà, perfect spot.

Except for the fact that there's little to no top soil there. A few inches,I'd say 3-4, at best. The rest is rocks and more rocks. Anybody has any experience using raised beds with hops ? How high should the beds be and how much volume would I need ? I was think about something like a foot and a half high and 3 feet by 3 feet might be enough, without being too bulky/ugly. I have a vegetable garden that uses the raised bed technique, but it'll be my first foray into hops.

Also, what are some good companion plants for hops to repell pests and should I add compost/manure to the soil (my soil is poor) ?

 

[day_trippr]

You don't have to go up very far, if you do down.

My hops are also planted along a two-level deck, and the "soil" was an amalgam of pretty much all the stuff you don't want in a garden.

So I dug out all that crap to make three 8'x3' pits, 18" deep, that I then filled with a mix of compost, cow poop, loam and sand, crowned to about 6" above grade.

I planted four rhizomes in each bed, set up a drip irrigation system, then mulched the heck out of the beds. Done and done. Hops leaped out of the ground and even this second year before I ever applied any fertilizer I had a crap ton of cones. The bines are over 24' tall - I erected some 10' tall temporary risers on the upper level deck to give the plants more height to grow. Serendipitously, almost all of the cones are in that last 10 feet, so I should be able to do almost all the harvesting just walking along the deck...
Cheers!

 

[jfr1111]

Thanks for the advice. Our house is built on a pretty serious slope and a lot of filler had to be brought in to make it level, especially on the front (where my hops will be), which explains in part the rocky situation (bad pun intended). And when I say rocks, I don't mean little ones. I have one that is probably 10-12 feet long by 4 feet wide where I wanted to put my strawberries. Needless to say, they got planted elsewhere.


Some patches are all sand and others are all clay. Hopefully our deck is next to the sandy patches. I did a lot of landscaping at the start of the summer (first house, woohoo!) and I'd be lucky to be able to get a hole 18" deep... I might just bite the bullet and transport them in another south facing location or build something 2-3 feet high so the root system will be able to develop enough.

 

[Boris_the_Russian]

I'm telling ya, listen to that man! ( day_trippr )
Dude knows how the story goes.

 

[GVH_Dan]

Too bad the house is built, otherwise I have a document I would suggest to help you out: DuPont's Solution to Boulders

Hops send roots down 10 feet or more into the ground. You are going to want to give them as much soil as you can, at least without killing yourself.

 

[LeSinge]

Hops send roots down 10 feet or more into the ground. You are going to want to give them as much soil as you can, at least without killing yourself.

maybe a post hole digger to loosen up the soil a little for the taproots...

somehow, I've managed to get pretty decent results out of five-gallon buckets on four separated plants, though now on year three, the gig is up and they need a new larger home.

Dan, correct me if I'm wrong, but the problem with pots, and smaller/taller raised beds, is the higher temps of the soil during summer.

 

[B-Hoppy]

LeSinge,

You can get decent results in 5 gal buckets but the crown gets very constricted. A rhizome planted in the ground will pretty much fill an entire 5 gal bucket in about 3 years, and that's just the 'crown' portion. The roots, if given space, will occupy more volume than the crown. Just imagine how they'd do with no boundaries?

 

[GVH_Dan]

They don't like to be constricted. You also have a problem in the winter of them getting too cold and freezing. In the ground, under snow, they don't really get that cold. But in a bucket above ground, they can get really cold.

 

[LeSinge]

yeah, third year there's not much dirt left in the bucket o roots...they're going into the 'wild' after harvest since I still have the main plants, and don't need that many Fuggles.
Buckets were buried underground..it will be interesting to see if/how the roots escaped the bottom through the small drainage holes.

 

[PariahVineyard]

Too bad the house is built, otherwise I have a document I would suggest to help you out: DuPont's Solution to Boulders

Hops send roots down 10 feet or more into the ground. You are going to want to give them as much soil as you can, at least without killing yourself.

Dan, you have the right idea. I need to get me some dynamite. We have a redrock vain running right through our vineyard that is causing a lot of problems.

The good 'ole days must have been fun. They just let anyone play with dynamite.

 

[Jamminjoenapo]

Other option for a few years is an Earthtainer. Costs about $40 to build (maybe). I have 2 rhizomes I planted in one this year. One is doing amazingly well growing up my 15ft fence and still going over to the neighbors yard. The other not so much, only about 6 ft tall and has some issue. Also you only have to fill it with water every 4 or so days, since it has a reservoir of water feeding the bottom. I'd imagine it would be good for a single plant for upwards of 3 years, though this is just my first year growing. Also makes the hops very portable if necessary.

 

[jfr1111]

Thanks everyone for the advice. I did a little digging and there is absolutely no top soil where I want to put my hops, as in none There's a big boulder there and it's not moving, so I'll have to put them eslewhere. Not even a raised bed would work. I have a strip of crappy deadish lawn next to the driveway. I know there are no rocks there, only filler, so I'll ask my stepfather if he could dig me a 2 feet deep pit with his backhoe and then I'll fill it up with good stuff. I'll have to erect a big freaking post though.

Maybe I'll just stick with tomatoes though

 

[Jamminjoenapo]

Thanks everyone for the advice. I did a little digging and there is absolutely no top soil where I want to put my hops, as in none There's a big boulder there and it's not moving, so I'll have to put them eslewhere. Not even a raised bed would work. I have a strip of crappy deadish lawn next to the driveway. I know there are no rocks there, only filler, so I'll ask my stepfather if he could dig me a 2 feet deep pit with his backhoe and then I'll fill it up with good stuff. I'll have to erect a big freaking post though.

Maybe I'll just stick with tomatoes though

Seriously Google earthtainer. Well worth it with bad soil.