August is hop harvest season, and it's the one time of year when we get to brew a beer using fresh, locally grown hops. We call ours Freshies Wet Hop. Everyone gets all fired up about Hops, they are used in almost every variety of beer made today - and IPAs are pounded with hops. We all love that big aroma, and bitter finish that these little plants provide.

So how do you get to be a part of this excitement? Grow your own hops, harvest your own hops! Hops are a pretty resilient plant, they like a lot of southern exposure to the sun, and beds that drain well. Otherwise - they grow like weeds. 

Hops grow from a rhizome (a what??) a rhizome, hops are a root plant, and they grow tall bines (not a typo), that make flowers we call hops.

Fall is the time to start looking for where to put your hop garden, but not the time to plant. Look for a space that is south facing and has lots of height. For my hop garden I have a tall rock wall in my yard and I planted my rhizomes at the bottom of the wall. Each year they climb the wall, and then extend about three or four feet above the wall.

Maybe you have a wall or a trellis that you want to cover, these are great spots to grow your plants. The rhizomes will not be planted until spring, but you can prep the soil now. If you are harvesting rhizomes from someone else plants, this is also done early spring time.

Start by planting your rhizome about 8 - 12 inches under ground and water lightly, but regularly. WIthin 2 - 3 weeks little shoots, called bines, will pop up through the soil. Extend strings or wooden trellis for these bines to climb. In the summer mine will grow a foot a day.

Keep them watered, and watch for flowers in mid-July - and they should be bursting with hop cones by early-August. My plants took a few years to really start producing. I think the first year I ended up with seven - yeah seven hop cones. But the second year I had a bucket, and now I could fill several buckets, and I have not added anything but water.

As summer turns to fall, your hop flowers will be ready to harvest. When they dry up slightly, leaves turn papery, and the aroma of a crushed hop flower stuns your nose, you know you are ready to harvest these beauties.

If your not sure what to do with these hops, there are lots of ideas out there. Maybe you are a homebrewer and you want to make your own Wet Hopped beer, or you could donate them to a local brewery to use in a specialty beer or firkin, or maybe you want to infuse them with some gin and make hop gin (mmmmm).

However you use them, the satisfaction of growing your own is pretty cool. Enjoy Fresh Hop Season, and get ready to plant your rhizomes in the spring!