Third Hop Cone Harvest!

After looking at the plants, I decided that I had more cones ready to pick, and again had one or two that had already fallen off the bines. After picking I had 6.9 oz of wet cascades and 2.1 oz of wet centennial cones. After drying, I netted 2.0 oz of cascades and 0.5 oz of centennials.

I also endeavored to build a Hop Plugger (right) after reading some posts on the Grow Hops forum. I have posted instructions and pictures of my Hop Plugger Project on my BrewTech blog. It worked pretty well and I will probably use it again if I get the chance to pick cones one more time this season.

No Impacts from Hurricane Gustav

We did get some wind, rain and cooler temperatures but nothing near what I was expecting for storms. Watching the radar for 2 days, for the most part Gustav fell apart right as it hit the Tulsa area. The cascade cones I picked Tuesday are dry and in the freezer, only 0.35 oz, but at least I didn't loose them to the storm.

It's been quite a while since I've fertilized, so I plan on mixing up some Miracle Grow all purpose 15-30-15 and dispensing across the plants this afternoon. We'll see if I can get a last push of energy with the plants to get some more cones before the weather starts to turn cold. Still haven't gotten to High Gravity to purchase ingredients for a brew so I can try out some of the cones I've already harvested.....GOTTA GET THAT DONE!

Hurricane Gustav - Heading This Way

Well, now it's just a Tropical Depression, but it's still heading toward Tulsa at this point. My hop plants have done well with the recent heat and I'm hoping that this storm doesn't damage them too much. I've already harvested some cones, but there are much more to harvest and I'd hate to loose them to the storm! I took some time this morning to go pick the most ripe cones, only picking 1.55 oz of cascade. I was going to wait a while longer until more were ready to pick, but I bet a good hard rain will knock some of the ripe cones off the bine as I've already noticed a few have fallen off on their own. Not a lot picked I know, but the 15 minutes of effort are better than loosing them in the storm.

Bring on the rain!

Hops Update - August 22

Here in Oklahoma, we're still trying to get through the hottest days of the year, and yes, they have not been kind to my hops. My plants are still healthy and producing cones, but man they don't look too pretty anymore! As you will see from some of the pictures in this post, some of my hop cones and leaves are significantly brown and wilting. The interesting thing is that this is happening while new growth is showing within inches of what looks to be almost dead!

I've been watering the hops each day when the temperature is over 90F and so far, they are surviving. They soak up the moisture (along with the hot day) and are ready for more the next day. I'm trying to decide whether or not to trim some of the bines back where I have already harvested cones, so that the plant can focus energy on new growth.

My Goldings plant is producing more and more cones, although they are all very small. I've heard others haven't had the best of luck with goldings in the lower latitudes, so maybe this just isn't the right climate. I'm not giving up though, hopefully I'll be able to at least harvest enough to brew one batch of my brown ale that uses goldings.

And lastly, is a picture of the whole hop garden. It's hard to believe that just 5 months ago, this area of the back yard was basically weeds that was a pain to mow! Now it is helping in my quest to brew good beer.....well, as soon as I get the ingredients pulled together to do a batch and start using some of the harvested hops!

Second Hop Cone Harvest!

This week I when I checked the Centennial and Cascade plants, I noticed I had a lot of cones browning (some significant). Also, the majority of the cones had that papery feeling so I decided to do another harvest. Below are pictures of the harvested cones. If you look closely, you can see some cones almost completely brown, with others while still mostly green have browning of the tips.






I also took one of the larger cascade hop cones and split it down the middle. If you look real close, you can see the yellow substance among the leaves which is lupin.










In total, I harvested 6.65 oz of Centennial and 12.95 oz of Cascade this time (wet). After drying, I ended up with 1.7 oz of Centennial and 3.5 oz of Cascade.

Here are my totals for the year so far:

Wet Harvest:
17.45 oz Cascade
8.15 oz Centennial

Dry Packaged:
4.55 oz Cascade
2.05 oz Centennial

Hops Update - July 31 Growth

It's been a few weeks since I posted an update. Not a lot to discuss in this post but I've included a few pictures I took the end of July. I was finally able to get a few good close up pictures of the cascade hop cones still on the bine. I also took a picture of the 2 cascade plants together that show a lot of cones, and the last picture shows the base of the OK goldings plant. On all of my plants I stripped the bottom 2 feet of vegetation to minimize the possibility of mildew and insect problems.

Hop Cone Drying and Packaging

The hope cones that were harvested last weekend have been dried and packaged. To dry them I took a house window screen I had in the garage and spread the picked hop cones on it. I left it in the garage for 2 days, placed so that air flow could reach the hops from above and below but didn't use a fan or applied heat to help in the drying process.

Once dry, I packaged in zip lock bags, compressing the hop cones to purge as much oxygen from the packaging as I could. I did run into a problem however. When compressing the cones in the bags, I did get punctures through the plastic. To fix this, I used a bag inside bag approach to ensure a seal. For the next harvest, I'm either going to get thicker bags, or possibly spend the money on a vacuum sealer.

In total, I ended up with 1.05 oz of dried cascade hop cones, and 0.35 oz of dried centennial hop cones.