hops!!!2010..

[specialed]

got to move a 3 year old plant today.   

Looking at those roots scare the hell out of me!
I have 8 plants, 4 per pole and now I know why they are so intermingled, I thought I was doing a good job above the surface keeping them separate, but I can only imagine whats going on below ground.
The chinooks seem to be the most abundant this year and really need to be harvested now, but it will have to wait a couple more week I am too busy to mess with them now.

The pole with the Hallertau, centennial, willamette and tettnang have really never done much and this is their 3 year.......I might get a few cones, but I am not expecting much again this year. The other pole has the cascade, chinook fuggle and goldings............I hope to get some fuggles and goldings, but I dont think it will be a lot.
Generally I guess I will still be buying a lot of hops to brew with.

[OffGrid]

did you take any cuttings of the roots? I'm still hoping someone here will send me some rizhomes to grow!

[specialed]

I wont be trimming anything before the Fall, but if I do I would be glad to send you some.

[BRONCOBOB]

Best time to harvest some rhizomes in in March......check back later....I could probably send you some then too.
I get about 20 ounces per plant......

[Landshark67]

Hi, new to this forum but was wondering if anyone growing hops now would be willing to swap a rhizome or two or three for some heirloom seeds or something I have. I want to grow some hops for next year and I have plenty of land to grow them on. Hell maybe we can work something out with sending you back some hops.

Come next Spring I will have boatloads of Cascade rhizomes to send your way.  If you didn't plant this season I suggest you prep the area you will eventually plant this fall.  Dig up the area, add in lots of good, fertile dirt (I mix in bags of Mo-Nur from Home Depot) and then cover up with some woodchips of other multch.  Come next Spring, you will have the perfect palnting/growing environment.

Ground prep is easy and there are lots of methods.  My favorite to date is to dig about 2ft down and create a trough.  I fill the trough with the new soil/fertilizer and then mound if up so that it's about 1 ft above the base.  The idea is to get the rhizome roots to grow down and then out in to the trough.  This helps with water retention and controls the root growth.  Hops are invasive little bastards and this helps slow down thrie radical growth patterns.

This is year 3 for me.  The first year was a small harvest.  Maybe 4oz dried.  Year two was better- 1lb 6oz.  This year was a banner year - 7lbs 13oz.  ...yes, picking that many hop cones is a pain! Beer helps the dull the pain.   I started with 6-Cascade and 4-Centennial rhizomes.  My approach was to plant two rhizomes in each location (create a map!). I'm now up to 8 bine location (4-6 bines each).

-Shark