Hop plants/rhizomes - growing report

[jceg316]

I've picked the Chinook growing in my inlaw's garden (almost forgot about it this year as last year it only produced 2 flowers) and still have a cascade at my parents' house. The Chinook gave me 26g dried, enough for a late addition.

 

[Gunge]

Well my First Gold is 'in'. 1100g wet, 250g after 3 days drying. That'll do.

 

[Cwrw666]

Just stumbled upon this video on youtube which seems pretty good - quite pleased I haven't got round to harvesting yet, but some of my cones are defo ready now.

Wish I'd seen this last week before I picked my cascade. Think I might been a bit soon. Still - we shall soon see as I made a green hop brew last week, basically Greg Hughes IPA recipe but substituting fresh cascade hops at 6x the quantity. Gave it a sniff last night and it smelt really nice and citrussy so I'm living in hope.

 

[dan125]

Wish I'd seen this last week before I picked my cascade. Think I might been a bit soon. Still - we shall soon see as I made a green hop brew last week, basically Greg Hughes IPA recipe but substituting fresh cascade hops at 6x the quantity. Gave it a sniff last night and it smelt really nice and citrussy so I'm living in hope.

Yeah I'm still holding out - they don't seem to have hardly changed over the last week, and I'm not getting many of the brown bits on the cones.
Come what may its going into green hop brew at the weekend.

Does anyone fancy a green hop bottle swap?

 

[chrisbjones202]

Good vid. I think I picked my EKG a bit early last year. It’s done really well this year (planted a stick last spring). Just been out and there are a couple of drying cones that smell great but mostly there still a bit green. Hoping to do a wet hop brew this weekend.

How are the Cascade grown in this country?

 

[dan125]

Still think I may have been too early, but I just picked this lot - 500g

 

[NIGHTSKY BREWING]

Picked my main crop of East Kent Goldings.... 2lb 4 oz wet..... all looks good so far but took 2 hours to pick......

 

[Cwrw666]

Had a look at my hops in the freezer - quite a lot of the cones have brown tips to them so maybe I'll be ok. I cut the bines off about 4 feet from the ground as the lower cones were definitely underdeveloped - just checked them and they now look ripe, so that's this afternoons job.

Anyway I have a plan for that first brew - when it's ready to bottle and if it's not hoppy enough I'll just make a hop tea and add it to it.

 

[NIGHTSKY BREWING]

How do prepare your Hop Tea..

 

[prog99]

I may have done my 1st harvest too early. Despite looking ripe they don't have much aroma (but taste bitter). I'm holding off a bit now before harvesting the rest which do at least seem to be smelling more hoppy now.

 

[BillyD]

My first time having a go at this and have done 2 plants in pots with no trimming and just letting everything grow that I harvested this morning. Got 75g off them, very weed like smell from one plant - I've got 2 different varieties that I moved and can't remember which is which!

What do you do with the plant after you've harvested ? I know you cut it right back towards the end of the year but they are in a bit of a state now and could do with sorting before I get any extra grief from The Boss.

 

[jceg316]

I just picked the last of my hops which was a cascade, quite a good haul, I'll measure it when it's dry.

My friend has a hop growing he can't do anything with, asked if I wanted it, which I kind of do... It's a cascade.

 

[dan125]

Just having a 1st try of my wet hopped brew - Its good, but I'd never have guessed it was made with Cascade if I didn't know.
Maybe its the fresh hop taste, or maybe because of the 'terroir' but it has a more earthy english hop taste to me.

 

[Gobaloon]

I picked mine last weekend and dried them with food hydrator. Small yield:

Centennaial 25g
Chinook 20g
Cascade 5g

Gonna do a soil test and see if I need to change anything. Also I didn’t add any nitrogen, potassium or phosphorus at all so will check that out.

Just ordered 6 plants on sale from Essentially Hops.

https://www.essentiallyhops.co.uk/acatalog/SALE-p1.html

Gonna sort soil out before I plant. Just how do I hide these from the family...until next Spring.

 

[Bigjas]

Well I have had a fantastic year for Hops. My Fuggle produced 1.6KG dried and my Progress produced 1.1KG dried. Both plants are in their second year. I've got so many hops I don't know what to do with them! Must brew more beer...….

 

[Cwrw666]

How do prepare your Hop Tea..

I didn't do it in the end. I was just going to boil up some goldings for an hour and add it to the FV if I felt it necessary but at bottling I didn't think the brew was too bad. Now, 3 weeks on it's actually not bad. It would have been a bit better if I'd increased the bitterness level but it's not mild enough to be unpleasant. I guess I should have gone for 10x the weight rather than 6x the weight (fresh hops compared to dried in the recipe).

 

[terrym]

Just thought I'd bump this thread since the growing season appears to have started.
I have two Prima Donna (First Gold) plants in large pots having planted the rhizomes last year. They each have upwards of 10 shoots on each plant with a few about 100mm long, and some shoots have overwintered . I have already cut a few off so that the remaining shoots are stronger. At present I will be aiming for 3 bines to string up.
I live in Sussex, so whats it like further north given the mildish winter we have had.

 

[Gobaloon]

I will check this weekend. Was thinking of putting my twine up last weekend but too cold and wet. I checked some a couple of weeks ago and had about 6 shoots on one plant coming up.

What did you reduce them to?

What does “over wintered” mean? Sounds bad!

 

[terrym]

I will check this weekend. Was thinking of putting my twine up last weekend but too cold and wet. I checked some a couple of weeks ago and had about 6 shoots on one plant coming up.

What did you reduce them to?

What does “over wintered” mean? Sounds bad!

I nipped off some of the small new shoots at soil level, leaving me with enough longer shoots to select the strongest later on for growing up the strings.
After I had cut the bines down in early Oct after they had died back, some new shoots grew from the plant bases and these shoots have survived the winter

 

[BeerCat]

Mine is close to a foot tall. Was crap last year so i just left it in an old youngs fermentor. Should i dig it up and plant some in the ground?