Hop Rhizomes and Hop Seeds
There can be no better feeling than handing over a cool refreshing beer to one of your friends and knowing that not only was the brew lovingly handcrafted by you, but that the ingredients were grown by you as well. This has to be the ultimate symbol of an experienced brewer.
Of course, growing all of the ingredients, will probably be beyond the realms of most of us (unless you are one of the lucky landed gentry with a few acres spare to grow your barley!) But with just a small piece of ground, a trellis and a little knowledge growing your own hops is a well within every home brewers capabilities.
There are two ways to start your own hop vines, planting hop rhizomes or germinating and planting hops seeds.
The easiest, and most common method is by planting rhizomes. A rhizome, also known as rootstock, is the horizontal stem of a plant that usually runs underground. When a bud forms on the rhizome, a new shoot will form which grows into a new plant.
Plant out your rhizomes in well-prepared soil, packed with thoroughly decomposed compost. Hops hate wet soggy ground, so to avoid this try building the soil up into mounds and incorporate drainage channels.
Once any threat of frost has passed plant out a group of 2 or 3 rhizomes about 3 inches below the surface of your mound with the buds facing upwards. It won’t be long before you see the first tender shoots breaking the surface.
Alternately, you could try your hand at growing hops from seed. Whilst this is just as easy as growing from a rhizome, it does require a lot more patience.
Plant your seeds just below the surface of a gritty, free draining compost. The best time to sow is towards the back end of autumn. Place you pot outside in an area that is protected from the worst extremes of weather. Then the waiting begins!
If you’re lucky the first signs of germination may become apparent after 4-6 months, if you’re not so fortunate, then you could be waiting for a year!
When, the hop seedlings are well established, prepare your ground as you would if you were planting hop rhizomes and transfer the strongest plants.
A word of warning though, the waiting doesn’t end there. You won’t be able to tell the sex of your hop plants until they are at least 3 years old.
If you would like to try growing hops at home then have a look on Ebay for hop rhizomes and hop seeds.
