Greetings all,
I tried to search a bit but ran out of time to see if this was already answered. I purchased 10 rizomes this spring (2x5 varieties). My father-in-law and I have a planting bed ready to go and want to put them in the ground this weekend. Given the bed and number of varieties should we plant two rizomes in each “mound” maximizing the spacing or do we plant individual rizomes about 2 feet apart and then space 5 feet or so between varieties?
What will give us the best result for this experiment. We live north of the Twin Cities and our soil is sandy but we plan to add compost to the mounds.
Thanks for your wisdom in advance.
http://www.freshops.com/hop-growing/hop-gardening
Pretty decent basic guideline to hop growing.
Guess your planting depends on the size of your planting bed.
If you’re new to growing stuff I’d plant two per hill and keep the different varieties spaced pretty well apart. At the end of the season you can lift them and separate if you’d like to split them up as one year’s growth won’t tangle them together very much. There’s a big difference between the establishment year and the second and succeeding years as during the first year, their main focus is to establish roots and grow some leaves. Year two, now that they have roots and a bunch of energy stored up, they begin to throw out rhizomes which will most likely not grow any further out from the crown than about 2 feet. Year three can be a different story if you don’t do some poking and prune some of those rhizomes as they’ll continue to grow and may put a few more feet on to what’s already there. This is the reason spacing is important when growing different varieties next to each other. As long as you do a good job of pruning you can grow them kinda close and not worry about them getting mixed up. Have at it!
With ten rhyzomes you are going to get a great deal of hops. I got 4 pounds off of two bines my first year. You need to plant each ryzome of the same variety 3 or more feet apart. Believe me the plants will fill in the space after a couple years if you are not agressive at keeping them seperated. plant differant varietird at least 5 feet from each other. you will still have to watch for runners from each trying to get other. I use a spade shovel and cut a perimeter around each variety each spring and fall. maybe once in the summer too. I Put mine in raised beeds with 4x4 timbers around the outside of each variety but they still go under and pop up in the weirdest places.
With you ten plants you will be elbow deep in hops in a couple years and will be wondering what to do with it all.
[quote=“pashusa”]
With you ten plants you will be elbow deep in hops in a couple years and will be wondering what to do with it all.[/quote]
Yeah, call lots of friends for harvest day and supply lots of homebrew. You won’t want to harvest them all yourself. 
What happens when different varieties are planted too close. Do they kill each other off? Produce a hypbrid like peppers do? What happens?
They just grow together and the bines get hard to tell apart and to keep separate. They will keep growing, and won’t hybridize (hop plants are all female unless there is a wild male nearby) but the roots and rhizomes can grow into a big tangle.
They just grow together and the bines get hard to tell apart and to keep separate. They will keep growing, and won’t hybridize (hop plants are all female unless there is a wild male nearby) but the roots and rhizomes can grow into a big tangle.[/quote]
+1 the whole reason you are planting differant varieties is because (i’m assuming) You want different hops to use in different beers. if you let them get all entangled you will not be able to tell what is what in the greater part of your harvest. it WILL be a big enough mess regardless.
when I harvest i just lay the whole bine down and have 3-4 people sitting on lawn chairs in a row with pails between their legs and the bine across their laps picking cones dropping them in buckets and sampling a home brew of their choice. it looks something like a quilting bee.
They just grow together and the bines get hard to tell apart and to keep separate. They will keep growing, and won’t hybridize (hop plants are all female unless there is a wild male nearby) but the roots and rhizomes can grow into a big tangle.[/quote]
+1 the whole reason you are planting differant varieties is because (i’m assuming) You want different hops to use in different beers. if you let them get all entangled you will not be able to tell what is what in the greater part of your harvest. it WILL be a big enough mess regardless.
when I harvest i just lay the whole bine down and have 3-4 people sitting on lawn chairs in a row with pails between their legs and the bine across their laps picking cones dropping them in buckets and sampling a home brew of their choice. it looks something like a quilting bee.[/quote]
Picking them off the bine is my favorite part…the big reward for the season’s hard work.
