Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

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Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Fri Feb 15, 2013 8:38 pm

Of course, the "correct" way to grow hops is by transplanting rhizomes of proven brewing varieties, i.e. asexual cloning. But if you're adventurous/arrogant/delusional/long-suffering enough, you can also experiment with growing your very own undiscovered cultivars from seed.

To do so, it helps to get things started in the dead of winter. You can scarify the seeds by lightly rubbing them on some fine sandpaper. Next, soak them in room-temperature sterile water for 24 hours, then mix them into some moist peat moss, bag 'em up and stratify them by refrigerating for at least a month. Be sure to write the contents and date with a permanent marker, because that's a long time to wait, and it's easy to forget when to perform the next step.

When the time comes, carefully fish out the seeds and plant them in small containers with high-quality, loose, loamy soil. Place them in a warm, well-lit, frost-free location such as an indoor windowsill. Keep them slightly damp, but definitely not soaked. Seeds will hopefully sprout in another month or so. Eventually, use your judgment to select the strongest/most desirable specimens to transplant outdoors. Setup a basic trellis, lightly feed with manure and/or organic fertilizer, and water responsibly. The first year's growth will be the slowest, as most of the plant's energy is being spent building its underground network. Be patient. You probably won't even know which are males and females, and you certainly won't get a crop of hops flowers from the females until the 2nd growing season.

Maybe, just maybe, you'll get some vigorous females, and maybe, just maybe one of them will have uniquely pleasant brewing properties. Probably not, of course, but when you think about it, you get some free seeds every time you buy whole hops, all the above steps only take a few minutes each and utilize common household materials, so there's no compelling reason not to try.

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by simple one » Fri Feb 15, 2013 9:38 pm

Nice little how to. I will become a botanical adventurer next year.

You tried Seymour?

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Fri Feb 15, 2013 10:02 pm

simple one wrote:Nice little how to. I will become a botanical adventurer next year.
Thanks. You do still have time, though. If you've got any whole hops stored, I guarantee you've got some seeds too, plus you already know you like the characteristics of one parent! It's not difficult.
simple one wrote:You tried Seymour?
Sure, many times. And I'm doing it again with some open-pollinated Cluster seeds this weekend, which gave me the idea for this thread. Some past seedlings went on to be used in my brews. But sadly, the last two years here had severe flooding in the spring, and severe heat and drought all summer, which obliterated all but two tenacious plants! I've come to terms with it, though, since "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger." I only want the strongest, most disease- and drought-resistent plants in my breeding experiments.

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by simple one » Fri Feb 15, 2013 10:23 pm

You get me wrong. I am not currently with 'proper garden'. Next year though moving back to my first home. Hence hop growing.

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Fri Feb 15, 2013 10:31 pm

simple one wrote:You get me wrong. I am not currently with 'proper garden'. Next year though moving back to my first home. Hence hop growing.
Oh, I getcha. You could always consider chiveleg's guerrilla gardening solution. :)

Did you read about this? /viewtopic.php?f=11&t=57351&hilit=+guer ... 15#p605748

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by simple one » Fri Feb 15, 2013 10:44 pm

Yes I know all about that. But a 150 mile move will make harvesting a problem.

What is the fail rate for hops from seed then?

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by scuppeteer » Fri Feb 15, 2013 10:48 pm

Are you saying you have managed to get them to grow from processed hops? IE already cooked and pressed???
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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Fri Feb 15, 2013 11:51 pm

scuppeteer wrote:Are you saying you have managed to get them to grow from processed hops? IE already cooked and pressed???
Sure I have, and you will too. Besides, whole hops aren't cooked, they're carefully dried so as not to spoil the delicate oils they worked so hard to produce. If you think about it, it's not so different from the process the seed would go through, lying on the ground being warmed by the sun. The pressing stage scarifies the seed coating a bit. Then you bag 'em up and place them in the fridge or freezer for a couple months, unknowingly simulating the winter stratification freeze/thaw cycle. The growers don't want us homebrew-gardeners to know this, but they're giving us the goods and doing much of the tricky work for us. :)

I can't remember exactly how many Cluster/O.P. seeds I have, but I'll count 'em this weekend and report on my results as I go. Last year I bought a pound of Cluster hops, spread 'em out on baking sheets and picked out the seeds with tweezers before vacuum-sealing the hops into smaller bags as usual. Just that easy. AND this crop was 8.7% AA which is very high for Clusters. AND they tasted great in my beers, so like I said: I know I like their mom, don't know anything about their dead-beat dad, but it'll be fun to observe the young'ns as they grow up.
simple one wrote:What is the fail rate for hops from seed then?
Having said all that, my fail-rate with all things garden-related is embarrasingly high. I've learned it's all a numbers game. If I want 3 or 4 vigorous habanero pepper plants, I need to start dozens of seeds. Even if I do everything right, to the best of my knowledge and abilities, only very few sprout, fewer survive the first month or so, and fewer still produce fruit. But as I said, it's not expensive or difficult to try, and it's pretty gratifying when the 1 out of 100 works out.

I love reading your Chiltern Seed Co catalogs. It was a long time ago, but I'm pretty sure that's where I read something that deeply affected the way I think. I'm surely butchering it, but it went something like this:

Q) ...but do you know how long it will take a tree to mature if I plant it by seed?!
A) Yes, a very long time, like 25 years in some cases, but the act itself is not difficult or time consuming, and it's the same amount of time it'll take to live your life ordinarily. Do you want extra big trees in your life 25 years from now or not?

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by scuppeteer » Sat Feb 16, 2013 12:09 am

Sorry not cooked, thats a local Kent/Sussex term for drying. I have tried several times to do this without success and have been told by the pro's that it's not likely to work. As you say its a game of numbers, the more you do, the more the likelyhood of success. Like the chances of a meteorite falling on your head... OK bad example! :lol:

I have some NZ seeds which I took for some reason before putting in the brew. You have inspired me to give them another go. :)
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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Sat Feb 16, 2013 5:53 am

scuppeteer wrote:Sorry not cooked...I have some NZ seeds which I took for some reason before putting in the brew. You have inspired me to give them another go.
Cool. Go for it, and good luck. If you haven't tried the sandpaper trick, I've found it makes a big difference.

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Tue Feb 19, 2013 4:07 am

I just finished my own little seed-starting operation. I took a few pictures so I could add a little quick-and-dirty Do-It-Yourself guide.

I didn't have any peat moss or seed starter soil left, and since I only needed a small amount it was cheaper to buy this cool little greenhouse thingy with peat pouches included. You can also see my container of seeds, and some fine sandpaper. Next, A close-up shot of the hops seeds. I counted 37. A few were empty husks and just crumbled into dust. The greenhouse has twelve peat pouches, so most of them got three seeds each. If many of them sprout, then I will carefully separate them into separate pots. But as I've said--if my past is any indication--very few of these guys will get that far along.
ImageImage


Here are the compressed peat thingies before they were rehydrated. Then, adding the pre-boiled hot water. After they absorb the water and swell-up, you drain the extra water, widen the mesh opening, and fluff-up the peat a bit.
ImageImage


Finally, the seeds have been scarified with some light sanding (see the cast-off kernels on the table?) and embedded in the peat. I replaced the clear top (see it steaming up in there?) and tucked it away in the fridge to stratify for a month.
ImageImage

After a month, I'll move it to a warm place, and if anything sprouts then I'll move them along to larger pots with real soil. I'll try to remember to update this thread as I go.
Last edited by seymour on Mon May 20, 2013 8:24 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Tue Apr 23, 2013 11:20 pm

Unfortunately, no sprouts yet from my previous Cluster/O.P. experiment but I'm still crossing my fingers. Of course, that didn't stop me from trying again with another variety.

Image

A BIG thank you to timbo41, who very graciously mailed me a packet of your intriguing Flyer hops. I'll show you how I pillaged them for seeds before giving them a try in a batch of beer (separate Brewday post here). They are over a year old, but appear to have been carefully stored in a vacuum sealed package. Another possible strike against me, which scuppeteer predicted, is evidence of severe drying (indeed, "cooking" is an accurate term compared to US hops I've dissected) which probably means they are no longer viable. But I know this for sure: nothing will grow if I don't try. If I do try, maybe just maybe an exciting new hybrid will grow.

For those of you who don't know: Flyer is an exciting new variety of UK hops, in that it possesses classic English traits and high alpha acids. It is apparently not a result of an intentionally breeding program, but rather, an unexpected discovery growing in an commercial hop field. Here is an active thread on this forum where homebrewers share their Flyer brewing experiences, which are overwhelming positive. You know how we often describe Centennial as a "super-Cascade"? The same grapefruit/pine resin/black currant American hops notes, but more of it and higher alpha acids? Well, I know this is an over-simplification, but it seems a similar analogy could be made: Challenger is a super-Goldings, and Flyer is a super-Challenger. At least, that would be really cool if true.

Image Image

So, here's what I did: I poured some out of the vacuum bag into a small baking pan, crumbled them by hand in order to break the seeds out of the centres, then sifted them through the collander, thus separating them from the larger flower petals. Of course, lots of other bits fell through the collander too, so I repeated the process several times until I got this...

Image

Then--with the patience of a saint--I picked through the pile with those blue tweezers, collecting hundreds of seeds. These I planted in several such recycled vegetable containers, watered, and set outside in hopes of germination. Wish me luck!

Image Image

Lastly, I bagged-up the poor crumbly Flyer hops for use in my next recipe. I'm sure I robbed lots of their precious hops resin, and oxidized the hell outta them, but as usual, that won't stop me from trying...

P.S. these hops smell frickin' awesome, by the way!
Last edited by seymour on Tue May 21, 2013 1:22 am, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Mon Apr 29, 2013 9:33 pm

Image

HELL YEAH! I have a feeling I'm the only dude in North America who has brewed with Flyer hops, but I can't be sure.

But I'm fairly confident I'm the only dude in North America (the world?) who is growing UK Flyer x O.P. hops plants.

A little slice of English genetics, right here on my front porch in St. Louie, baby!

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by timbo41 » Mon Apr 29, 2013 9:41 pm

Love it top man!
Just like trying new ideas!

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Re: Reminder about hops seeds: now is the time.

Post by seymour » Mon Apr 29, 2013 10:06 pm

timbo41 wrote:Love it top man!
All thanks to you, Mate!

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