soil questions.

[Jako]

This weekend i plan to plant my first hop rhizome. i have a very large planter i plan to use the first year or two since i am currently building a new house. My question is what type of soil should i be looking at?

I just need a good place to start. I am a step by step type, this way i cant mess it up lol. If it helps i have a Centennial rhizome.

 

[bobeer]

I was in the same situation a few years ago. I still have most of my plants in pots too. Really big pots!

I just used miracle grow potting soil mixed with a little compost/manure mixture when I first planted them. I think I planted them an inch or two below the dirt then just kept them moist and in the sun for 6+ hours or so. You can use those tomato cage things to train the little bines on. Be sure to water when the soil is dry and fertilize once a month or so. Good luck!

 

[Jako]

I was in the same situation a few years ago. I still have most of my plants in pots too. Really big pots!

I just used miracle grow potting soil mixed with a little compost/manure mixture when I first planted them. I think I planted them an inch or two below the dirt then just kept them moist and in the sun for 6+ hours or so. You can use those tomato cage things to train the little bines on. Be sure to water when the soil is dry and fertilize once a month or so. Good luck!

thank you for the help. how are your plants doing after a few years in the pots? going to go out and buy what i need today. it will be my mid week project.

 

[bobeer]

thank you for the help. how are your plants doing after a few years in the pots? going to go out and buy what i need today. it will be my mid week project.

3 of the 5 the roots actually grew through the bottom of the pot so those 3 are huge and doing just fine. I transplanted them into much bigger pots this year though. Still trying to figure out where to plant them which is the only reason they're still in pots.

The other 2 I didn't' really do much with last year since we bought a new place. They look more like 2nd year plants but they're still happy. I put one of them in the ground and re-potted the other one into a bigger pot.

As long as you keep feeding them, and give them room to grow, they should be ok in pots for the first few years.

 

[Jako]

3 of the 5 the roots actually grew through the bottom of the pot so those 3 are huge and doing just fine. I transplanted them into much bigger pots this year though. Still trying to figure out where to plant them which is the only reason they're still in pots.

The other 2 I didn't' really do much with last year since we bought a new place. They look more like 2nd year plants but they're still happy. I put one of them in the ground and re-potted the other one into a bigger pot.

As long as you keep feeding them, and give them room to grow, they should be ok in pots for the first few years.

great to know. do you have the plants near the house and run a line up the roof how do you train the vines.

 

[bobeer]

In the first year I just used a tomato cage and helped them every couple of days train around it. Now, I have a basic trellis and will have to tie jute chord to it and attach it to the top of my shed they're growing near. I also have a pot that I punched a hole in the side/top of it and ran jute chord up to a tree branch about 15 feet up.

I just saw an old post in the "show us your trellis" thread or whatever it's called... a guy ran some chord across a privacy fence and trained the hops to grow along the fence. I might try this with one of my potted plants and see if it works as well as his picture showed.

 

[Jako]

thanks for the tips. i hope to run mine up the side of my house to keep some of the morning sun off the side of the house. i will check out that thread to get some ideas.

i ended up getting rained out last night that wasn't fun at all.