Faith and Uncertainty in Hops Farming

I came across this video that was taken at the Rising Sun Farms of Colorado, one of only a handful of hop farms in the United States growing organically. A late spring hail storm caused serious damage to this 9-10 acre hopyard.



 This video is heartbreaking to watch, particularly to the fellow hop grower. As noted in the video, most of the tender hop shoots were broken from the hail storm, which is likely to stunt the growth of the entire hopyard. One of the comments on the video came from another experienced grower who mentions new shoots will develop just below where it was damaged and continue to grow upwards. True - but such damage is likely to reduce yields significantly, not to mention the additional labour required for retraining the bines.

At our hopyard, we notice that hop plants respond to broken shoots by initiating secondary shoots along the entire bine. Unless these shoots are pruned, dozens will develop simultaneously, creating a bushy like appearance below the point of damage.

From the plant's perspective, this makes sense. As a survival strategy, an explosion of new shoots ensures at least a few bines latch on to the climbing substrate to continue their vertical trajectory. From the perspective of the farmer, this is simply unnecessary vegetative growth and an inefficient use of available nitrogen.  The solution, as we have discovered, is to prune all other side shoots except for ONE just below where the damage occurred. The plant then concentrates its energy into developing this single shoot. This should be done as soon as possible to encourage this single shoot and discourage continued growth of other side shoots.

In any unavoidable disaster such as the one at Rising Sun Farms, its always a good idea to have a few cold ones in the fridge to lessen the blow. Best of luck to those growers in Colorado!

Hopateers

April was coming to a close and our seven hundred and fifty-nine hops needed to be planted.  I also needed to celebrate my 30th birthday. Light bulb moment. Plan a planting party for the first weekend in May with everyone I know. What an idea! Don't bring gifts just bring your enthousiasm for digging holes! This could have been a tough sell but fortunately I convinced 18 friends from Vancouver who made the trek over the Duffy or through the Fraser Canyon, while pushing through high elevation snow flurries and avoiding unexpected roadside ungulates, respectively. Include the brothers et al from Whistler (5) and a peppering of our limited local contacts (4) and we had a serious party on our hands!
After distributing a few dozen cups of coffee around and rousing a few stragglers from their tents, we began prepping the field. This turned out to be a larger task than we we thought. Fifteen rows needed to be tilled up, cleared of surface rocks, 150 tractor buckets of compost needed to be spread, and of course, the planting.
Hal worked the Woods rototiller in a not-so-traditional fashion by working one 5' section at a time across the field. A dedicated Heather assisted Hal in keeping within the planned rows.

With the soil loosened, myself and a few well-trained tractor operators started depleting our massive compost pile one bucket load at a time. At this point, the compost had been breaking down for just two months and microbial activity had slowed producing a fine organic blend ready to add to the hop yard.

Once the compost was dumped, the crew put their backs into it to have it evenly spread along the rows. A farm can never have too many shovels.

By mid-day there was considerable progress on the field prep. Although we roughed up the green manure a bit, the the young oats and vetch continued to grow throughout May (more to come on the green manure).

The storm clouds started to develop by mid-afternoon and it appeared as though my sunny weekend guarantee was going to backfire in my face. Backfire with hail, to be specific. The change in weather was marked by a strong wind gusts twisting around the confluence of the Cayoosh and Fraser Rivers.

Workers rested on their shovels to witness the change in atmospheric energy and contemplated returning to the shack to change into more weather-proof apparel. This was a good idea, as a rain shower turned into hail and back to rain. Despite the terrible conditions, there was a cheery mood in the air with the crew donning their uniquely-coloured rain jackets!

By this time, we were ready to get the plants into the ground. What better tool to use than the classic maddock?

We spaced the holes 3.5' apart and filled them with organic amendments including bone meal, kelp meal, canola meal, and ash collected from burned ponderosa pines from around the property.

 This is where the real assembly line work began and prompted a few to provide refreshments and nourishment to the rest. Bottled home brew made with last year's hops and Pilsbury's cookies to be precise.

Productivity did eventually slow to a stand still but only after the entire acre was prepped and about 300 hops were planted into the ground. Job well done! Silliness ensued...