Seeking Your Advice on Hops...

Ms. Caylor · Feb 8, 2020

Howdy from beautiful Travis County, Texas. My name is DeAnn and we live on a beautiful rural property in the eastern part of the county - rich bottom land with no rock or cactus. I am married to an organic gardener and am going to begin growing hops this Spring, with an eye to providing local brewers with high quality, wholly environmentally-controlled plants. I am interested in knowing which species are favored, anyone's experience growing hops, whatever you would be willing to share. Thank you - I'm excited about the prospects. And if you live in or near Austin, perhaps you might like to become a customer!

Ward Chillington · Feb 16, 2020

Welcome to the site...From the very little I know about growing hops, you kinda need to match your local climate to the strain you are going to grow. I did a tour last year at nearby Flying Dog who has partnered up with the University of Maryland's Ag school who has been interested in reestablishing hops as a local crop. Here's a link to get you started and if you search on Flying Dog and hops, there is ton more where that came from.

https://extension.umd.edu/carroll-county/agriculture/hops-maryland

The whole "Eat Local" movement is being capitalized on by the local famers and brewers here and I think it's great! If you don't buy your stuff local, you are not gonna be able to get your stuff local! Unlike my food, I drive a long way for work and most of the drive is through agricultural portions of 2 states and 4 counties, by and large it's corn and beans but there are no less then 5 small breweries that are using some sort of locally sourced something to put in their beer. It might be hops, it might be honey but like anything in farming today, you can contact the local county extension like the guys at Flying Dog did.

Good luck with the venture! I think you'll find that Cascade, Chinook and Willimette are pretty widely used but you may want to check with the local or in your case as a future supplier, regional guys, to see what they are brewing so your supply meets demand....as well as what your local climate will grow best...and I hope that powdery mildew is not a problem there in beautiful Travis County!

4Bentley · Feb 16, 2020

I would poll the local brewers. The root stock is not available for a lot of the new flavoring hops, so you may be providing more bittering hops. Hops is fun to grow. They need lots of water and sun, but not heat, so good luck.