Solstice is 4 weeks away. How much growth to expect

Yakima 728
Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum

Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
B

BaylessBrewer

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jan 6, 2015
Messages
808
Reaction score
137
Location
Affton
My tallest plant is 6' and my shortest is about 18" tall. How much growth can one expect out of first year rhizomes between now and when the Solstice arrives? As I understand it I don't want to feed any Nitrogen after the Solstice to allow the plant to flower.
 
I'm in a similar boat and am also curious how much more growth I can expect. Following along to see what others say.
 
Not sure if it matters on location but I'm in St.Louis, MO. Anyone local have experience as to when you typically stop feeding in our area and burr formation starts?
Just checked them today and all plants grew between 4-6 inches since yesterday!
 
I'm in Denver, My first year plants grew the most in the month of June last year, and slowed down mid July and started flowering. I would expect vigorous growth for the next 6 weeks or so....
 
cavman22 said:
I'm in Denver, My first year plants grew the most in the month of June last year, and slowed down mid July and started flowering. I would expect vigorous growth for the next 6 weeks or so....
Click to expand...


Awesome! It looks like mine are starting to take off now. Day to day growth is now easily seen. How are your plants doing this year?

On another note I'll be coming to Denver the end of June. Wife and kids want to see the mountains so off we go!! Any breweries you highly recommend visiting while I'm out there? We will be leaving STL on the 30th and returning on the 6th.
 
I am in St. Louis myself in the S. County area. I can tell you that this year our spring was colder than normal so growth has been stunted a bit. We are about 2 weeks behind normal growing conditions. Every year is different. I just applied some fish fertilizer today to help with nitrogen as my hops are starting to take off. I stop my weekly nitrogen as soon as I see burrs forming. Then I use a fertilizer with very little nitrogen and more phosphate and potash in it. Don't worry so much about solstice and just pay attention to burrs forming and you'll be fine. Being first years I would back off nitrogen early July if no burrs form. You may not get anything first year. I usually harvest late August to early September. Hope that helps.
 
dirtyd90 said:
I am in St. Louis myself in the S. County area. I can tell you that this year our spring was colder than normal so growth has been stunted a bit. We are about 2 weeks behind normal growing conditions. Every year is different. I just applied some fish fertilizer today to help with nitrogen as my hops are starting to take off. I stop my weekly nitrogen as soon as I see burrs forming. Then I use a fertilizer with very little nitrogen and more phosphate and potash in it. Don't worry so much about solstice and just pay attention to burrs forming and you'll be fine. Being first years I would back off nitrogen early July if no burrs form. You may not get anything first year. I usually harvest late August to early September. Hope that helps.
Click to expand...


Sweet! Nice to hear from a local as to what they commonly see. I'm in Affton myself so....... Can't be much that separates us and growing conditions. All of my plants are really starting to take off. I checked on them again today and they put on another good 6 inches of growth and are starting to get what I assume are side arms . My trellis is short this year at only 8 ft but I'm assuming it will be ok for this year. I'm not expecting any hops off them but I won't be upset if they throw some burrs. [emoji2]
What fertilizer do you use when you start to see burrs? Currently I'm using Alaska Fish Emulsion and some organic vegetable slow release 8-8-8.
 
BaylessBrewer said:
Awesome! It looks like mine are starting to take off now. Day to day growth is now easily seen. How are your plants doing this year?

On another note I'll be coming to Denver the end of June. Wife and kids want to see the mountains so off we go!! Any breweries you highly recommend visiting while I'm out there? We will be leaving STL on the 30th and returning on the 6th.
Click to expand...

I'd recommend Great Divide, Prost, or Denver beer company in Denver. Boulder area I'd go to upslope or twisted pine. There is basically a brewery or two in very mountain town too.

I'm from STL... Grew up in south county. My college roomate went to Bayless high school. Small world
 
cavman22 said:
I'd recommend Great Divide, Prost, or Denver beer company in Denver. Boulder area I'd go to upslope or twisted pine. There is basically a brewery or two in very mountain town too.



I'm from STL... Grew up in south county. My college roomate went to Bayless high school. Small world
Click to expand...


Holy smokes!!! What a small world! My kids go to Bayless!! Crazy!
Thanks for the recommendations. I'm going to do my best to get to a couple taprooms and a brewery or two while out there.
 
BaylessBrewer said:
Holy smokes!!! What a small world! My kids go to Bayless!! Crazy!
Thanks for the recommendations. I'm going to do my best to get to a couple taprooms and a brewery or two while out there.
Click to expand...

Check out Avery BC in Boulder. I Met the brew masters right before they closed a few years ago, and they stayed open for a few hours so my friend and I could chat them up and drink beer.

When I lived in Colorado Springs, I really enjoyed Phantom Canyon BC in downtown. Cool atmosphere and good food. Plus they serve some great beer.

There's over 100 breweries in CO. I'm sure you will be hard pressed NOT to find one that's serves great beer. Have fun, I miss CO
 
I use Fish Emulsion 5-1-1 and then switch to an organic granular called Flower Power at 3-6-4 I believe it is. I am in Sunset Hills. Growing Nugget, Centennial, Columbus, and Neo1.
 

Similar threads

duffy5018
How aggressive are hop roots?
Replies
16
Views
4K
NitrogenWidget
N
Jako
Moving to greenhouse hop growing.
Replies
0
Views
652
Jako
Jako
pacostagli
Simple Question - When to move into Secondary?
Replies
27
Views
3K
pacostagli
pacostagli
M
Pruning question
Replies
2
Views
923
messersc
M
CallMeKiupid
My First Brews .... what should I look out for?
Replies
10
Views
1K
CallMeKiupid
CallMeKiupid

Latest posts

Back
Top