So first Year Hop Growers - how'd it turn out ?

[Kilgore_Trout]

LOL, it's on my property, he has to deal with it whether he likes it or not. Sure it looks like a flag pole with some twine attached during the early part of the season and winter, but once the foliage starts to fill in I think it would be tough to say it looks ugly, even if you don't like vines/hops. I plucked off 2 yesterday since we were talking out front and rubbed them between my hands and let him smell. His eyes lit up and said, "Man that really does smell like hops!". Hopefully he's finally turning the corner. The wife (his), I could care less about her feelings.

If it comes down to it, I find that a bit of free beer solves any problem

 

[brrman]

I never saw a single flower in 3 plants. And then 2 weeks ago they were all pretty much destroyed in a hail storm. First year = disappointed.

 

[Seabee John]

I think it was an over all good year with mixed results. Of the 6 original variations I planted originally I had only fuggles survive. It grew to about 14 feet and yielded about 1/2 oz of cones (dry). I then planted (later) one each of the following: nuggets, cascade, & kent goldings. The cascade and the goldings grew to about 12 feet but yielded maybe a dozen cones each. My nuggets on the other hand grew like a friggin weed (16+ feet) and yielded about 1/2 pound - dry and is pictured below:

Over all, I'd call it a success. I learned the importance of consistent watering, good and bad fertilizing, and when to harvest (nuggets anyway). Now I'm researching the best method of producing rhizomes. I've already planned to expand to 6 cascade plants, six fuggles, 3 nuggets, and 3 goldings.... of coarse, if any of you want to provide advise on switching those numbers up (I've got room for 3 beds of 6 plants) let me know what you would plant and why. I pretty much stick to browns, pales and stouts.

 

[salad 419]

I never saw a single flower in 3 plants. And then 2 weeks ago they were all pretty much destroyed in a hail storm. First year = disappointed.

Same here, with Chinook, Goldings and Willamette. But, We had a wind storm (77 mph winds) that unwound the bines from the twine and left a big mess.

All of the plants grew to about 7-8 feet. Although until August, I grew them horizontally.

I wasn't expecting much of a harvest, but it would have been nice to see a few cones.

 

[zoebisch01]

I got about 8 oz of dried Cascade from my first year plants. Second year Brewer's Gold got me around the same dried (2 plants). Tettnang got hit by Japanese Beetles and the one Magnum did well but I missed the window.

 

[McKBrew]

A whopping .3oz from my Fuggles. Quite a bit more free hops from someone else. :

 

[Zymurgrafi]

First year plants. All in dry cone ready to brew weights:

1 Cascade = 9 oz.

1 Centennial = 3 oz.

2 Wild/Feral (planted this year from rhizomes I dug up last spring) = 10 oz.

1 Golding = 0 oz. Struggled to survive.

I am suspecting from the aroma and other clues that the feral hops may be cluster. I just brewed a one gallon SMaSH batch to see how they are using them for all hop additions. Guess to know for certain i'll have to brew one with commercial clusters (if I can get any) to compare.

I could have picked more of the wild/feral ones but since I was not sure of their quality; and i was tired, I figured I would wait to see how they are. I would have had more Cascades if it weren't for the damn aphids! I estimate at least 3 more oz. dry. Oh well. I am happy regardless.

 

[GilaMinumBeer]

3.5 pounds total dried harvest from a plot of 3 second year plants and 10 first year plants. At the least I harvested 4 ounces from some after drying them and at most I harvested 1 pound dried from others. A few yielded no harvest at all.

At this point all but 2 plants have been cut down and will very soon be prepared for overwintering with a judicious layer of compost.

 

[CarlLBC]

All first year hops.

4 Cascade: 8 oz and still has cones
4 Mt. Hood: .5 oz, all grew well, high hopes for next year
4 Willamette: zilch, all grew well, we'll see
4 Sterling: nada, all grew well, we'll see

they all did very well considering the south Ga climate. the thing that suprised me was the ant problem. at the base of the hops I stripped the leaves to keep moisture down. ants ate the bine area near the ground. kinda like eating a corn cob. don't ask me why. maybe the bines taste as good as the flowers. once I noticed (I admit I was slacking) I seven dusted and had no further problems but the bines died before they produced. this happend to all but the cascades. I have bad ant problems all over my property, i'll be sure to keep an eye on it next year. the roots seem to be fine and more bines started to sprout soon after the others died.

 

[Rhino17]

Here is southern Ontario, I planted 2 cascade, 2 chinook and 1 willamette.

The willamette was the quickest to grown, reached the top of my 10ft line, and then didn't produce anything. Huge numbers of sidearms, but no cone production.

The Chinook both grew well (but only 2 bines each), and produced a total of 4 oz dried between the 2 plants.

For the Cascade, only one rhizome grew (and only 2 bines). Once they reached the top, I accidentally broke the tip of the growth shoot off of one of the bines. The other was allowed to grow horizontally for 3 feet, and then it ran out of room. From this one plant, I had a dry yield of 8.5 oz.

So, overall, a pretty sucessful first year. Looking forward to year 2!

Cheers,

Rhino

 

[TommyBoy]

This was the second year for my Cascades. 7 vines. The tallest one hit 14' before July then the top cooked on the roof and bushed up at the top. The others were about 12-14' by September. They dried out to about 4oz. I did no preparation to the soil. I will probably pay attention to that next spring to beef them up a little.

 

[antonyw]

I planted four cascade, two chinook, two fuggles and two centennials this spring. Two of the cascades went into an old wine barrel with miracle gro potting mix, I got about 1.5 - 2ozs dried from those two plants and they ended up being about 12-15 feet in length. I got another 1 oz or so from the two other cascades planting in the ground in full sun. The centennials croaked and never did anything. The fuggles were very sluggish at only a foot or two long but are still growing so hopefully they are working on their roots and will do better next year. The chinooks grew to about 8 feet long and gave me maybe three or four cones. They were planted right next to the cascades that yielded nicely in their first year. I'll have to go back and read the thread now and see how everyone else did.

 

[Dig]

Plants are still growing. I have been getting small harvests all year long. I can definetly tell what the photoperiod does to the plant; the internodes get really short and the leaves get small. The plants are still healthy and growing however, so I will just let them go until the look ready to be cut down. They are very bushy and quite large for being grown in pots. I probably have a few ounces from six plants.... only 2 of the have really produced, although all six have shown signs of flower production.

Will continue to update. I still have several plants to harvest and some are kicking out new flowers.

 

[fins2rit]

planted 8 plants
2 cascade
2 centi
2 chinook
1 will
1 mt. hood

All grew real well hitting about 12 to 14 feet each with allot of side shoots toward the base but ZERO hops. I am hoping that the roots decided to grow crazy and next year i will have a nice harvest..

Got my fingers crossed..

 

[Stout Man]

Plant

Yield​

1 Chinook

21 oz​

1 Zeus

19 oz​

4 Nugget

40 oz​

1 Cascade

2 oz​

1 Hallertauer

1/2 oz​

1 Northern Brewer

0​

1 Fuggle

0​

1 Kent Golding

0​

1 Mt. Hood

8 oz​

My Fuggle did produce about 10 cones but the Golding and N.Brewer produced nothing. They do however have absolutely massive root systems. I am amazed how much the root system grew. All plants are first year. I'd definitely be willing to give away some of my nugget plants for any low alpha acid hops. It is a pain to store all those nugget hops, I end up with 13 vacuum bags about the size of a 8 1/2" x 11" that are 1" thick. I know how ungrateful I sound but seriously, how am I going to use up all those nugget hops?

 

[Blackline]

I also planted for the first time this year. I chose the chinook since I live in Phoenix and the weather gets a little warm

I planted 6 and 5 came up. They looked and smelled great! Before harvest I went on a vacation for a week and when I came back my cones were toasted slightly from the sun. I harvested them anyway and dried then froze them. You guys think they are still good? I will get a photo of them to show how toasted they got.

Here are a couple of pics of the plant a couple of months in. The wife only let me put up a 8' stake... Picasa Web Albums - Mike Moffett - HOPS!

 

[Beeropolis]

Planted 2 first year plants at my apartment, so no in-ground but into a large pot I planted these. The Cascade plant grew large and with multiple harvests got approx 2oz of hops. On the other hand my Kent Goldings plant grew as large as the Cascade plant but no harvest. Some very small cones started to form in September but a cold spell happened in VA and that stopped it quick.

 

[avidhomebrewer]

My first attempt at growing 2 plants (Cascade and Chinook) went horrible this year. Earlier in the year, the chinook was going great, about 5 feet tall. Time to transplant and one of the neighbor kids pulled it out of the ground and it decided it had had enough and died for the year (hopefully only the year). For the cascade, it didn't do much at all, especially when the dog got a hold of the rhizome and decided to chew on it. That was the last time she ever decided to do that again. I then transplanted it and now it is about 2 feet tall, ready to die for the year. Hopefully next year both will come up and grow like I heard hops can.

 

[Stratotankard]

Let's see...

6 plants- 2 each Centennial, Golding, and Willamette. One of my Goldings turned male on me, the other never got taller than about 3'. My Willamettes did ok height wise, but then got destroyed by catapillars. They both have about 4 leaves a piece left. My Centennials both did very well height wise (draped over the top of my 9' trellis) but only one has any cones at all. I've harvested 3 cones so far and there is at least one more still one the vine (still tiny but growing). Both plants are being attacked by the damn catapillars, but I'm working hard to keep them alive. I'm trying not to use any sprays, just to keep my garden as organic as possible, but next year I think I may have to break out the chemicals to deal with the little buggers.

I know I need to water more than I did this year. Maybe a drip irrigation system is in my future. My trellis almost got blown over during some severe weather, so that needs to be redone (its really wobbly anyways). Meh, I wasn't expecting much this year, so I guess 4 whole cones is better than nothing.