New information about growing hops

[billvelek]

For those who grow hops or are considering it, I have a couple of bits of information that you should find interesting.



First, most homegrowers have no idea of what the alpha acid content of
their hops is; I've done a LOT of searching and reading in a LOT of
forums, and up until now the universal concensus was that you have only
four practical choices:

1. Spend money (about $40 in the U.S. IIRC) to have a lab test it;

2. Do a comparative taste test which could be tedious and inaccurate;

3. Use homegrown hops only for flavor or aroma, so AA% won't matter;

4. Trial and error: just brew with it and adjust future batches.



Now I have come across a new approach that I hadn't read nor heard
about anywhere; doing your own chemical test. I've just been
engaged in a discussion on the Usenet group rec.crafts.brewing and
another brewer mentioned that he titrates his hops to determine their
AA content, and has provided some valuable info for anyone interested
in doing that. Here is the Google display of that thread:
http://tinyurl.com/yrp4zw -- see the four posts beginning with one by
wpollitz on Feb. 4th at 12:01am and my replies. Also, this
apparently isn't actually a new method -- just new to _ME_; you can do
a google of 'titrate AND hops' and find other sources of info.



Second, for those who have never heard of 'vernalization', it's a
process which signals the hop plant that it has been through the winter
season, and is supposed to affect the amount of flowering (cones) that
your plants will produce. Some growers in the southern U.S. have
had some poor harvests which we suspect might be tied to the lack of
vernalization. This website -- http://tinyurl.com/yulvg8 --
states that "The concensus among hop researchers is that hops need
about six weeks of vernalization at 3 degrees C (about 38 degrees F)."
Now, my weather has been too mild -- it was 78F/25.5C on February 4th
and 69F/20.5C on February 5th -- and that's the middle of winter
here. As an experiment, I dug up one of my hop crowns and have
put it into my beer refrigerator where I will keep it for six weeks and
then replant it, and I'll then compare the harvest I get from it and
the other plants. If anyone else has done anything similar, or
has more info about vernalization, I'll appreciate hearing about it.



Our Grow-Hops Yahoo Group now has over 900 members; we specialize in
coverage of ONLY 'growing' beer ingredients like hops, brewing-herbs,
and barley, and we do NOT permit other brewing topics, so we encourage
everyone to remain active in their current forums even if they join us.
If interested, please visit http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Grow-Hops



Cheers.



Bill Velek

 

[grapeman]

Thanks for the information Bill. I will have to check the sites out. I haven't grown any hops to date, but have considered it. My nephew grew some locally last year and they did quite well.


While I know it wouldn't give you accurate amounts of alpha acid content, couldn't one have a rough idea of a range of it depending on hops variety grown since they all seem to have a range specific to that variety?


I know we wouldn't have an issue here of vernalization since we have about 5 months a year of temps lower than 38 deg. I would have to be sure to grow mildew resistant varieties here. There used to be a thriving hops industry locally before the great outbreaks of mildew hit.

 

[billvelek]

snip ...While I know it wouldn't give you
accurate amounts of alpha acid content, couldn't one have a rough idea
of a range of it depending on hops variety grown since they all seem to
have a range specific to that variety?
... snip

Well, that will certainly give you a
_rough_ idea and a starting point, but picking the middle of the range
would probably fall into the fourth option -- trial and error --
because if you are off very much, then you'd probably make an
adjustment either up or down. What is appealing about the
titration test is -- to the extent that it is more accurate and gives a
numerical value -- that when you create a beer with your hops that you
like and want to share the recipe or make it again with commercial
hops, you'll have a more precise idea of what the IBU's were.



Cheers.



Bill Velek

 

[PeterZ]

Bill,


You can tell Bill P. that the reason he cannot get to yahoo groups or mail is because the Navy blocks them specifically. They also block google mail, hotmail, etc.

 

[billvelek]

Bill,


You can tell Bill P. that the reason ...

I just forwarded your message to Bill P.



Cheers.



Bill Velek