Arizona Hops!!!

I planted 4 rhizomes about a week ago. I planted two cascade and two chinook. Just today one of my chinook vines broke ground. I'll keep you guys posted once they start getting bigger and let you know how they fair the hotter weather during summer.

awesome...if it wasn't for my dogs and small'ish backyard i'd grow my own as well.

I have dogs as well, so I ended up planting them in the front of my house instead of the back.

very cool guys. i'll be planting 9 rhizomes at work, and 2 at home.....12th and ajo

will keep updated with status!

tucsonmike said:

very cool guys. i'll be planting 9 rhizomes at work, and 2 at home.....12th and ajo

will keep updated with status!

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I can picture your co-workers now staring out the office window at you on lunch break...why is Mike picking those little green pine cones off those bushes...and keeps smelling them by the handful...OMG I think he just ate one!

here's a picture from 2007 i believe of wild hops I picked up on mt lemmon(work).

i ended up dumping the first beer i made because it tasted like pure hop extract...live and learn

the weather up there is perfect for growing in the summer!

Good job!
I lived in AZ (Tucson/Sahuarita area) for many years and all my attempts to grow hops were met with crushing failure.
Over here where I live now hops grow wild!

Definitely keep an eye on them when the furnace of ultra hot/dry wind comes in June. They might dry out like a cracker!
Mt. Lemmon, OTOH, is a different story...

Cheers!

How about up in Flagstaff? About to put two Wilammettes in planters facing south, get some growth in before monsoon season, we have a climate similar to mt.lemmon so I hear

Flagstaff should be fine for growing hops.
I live in similar weather (low elevation) and hops grow wild.

First update....

All 4 of my hops have broken ground and are looking healthy for now. Here's a picture of on my my chinook plants. I live on the East side of Tucson near Broadway and Prudence.

Andrikos said:

Flagstaff should be fine for growing hops.
I live in similar weather (low elevation) and hops grow wild.

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7000 feet give or take a few hundred is hardly considered low elevation, but I have high hopes. One local guy who actually managed to start his own brewery grows cascades, enough to put out a limited supply of single-hop IPA at the brewery proper. Looks like those Tucson plants are off to a good start. Only thing that sucks about FLG is I've been covering/will have to keep covering the rhizomes at night since we're going through a 3-day freeze and it will still be below freezing a few nights here and there well in to May methinks.

Here's a pic of some wild hops up on mt lemmon. they're at about 8000 feet. pic was taken 2 weeks ago. the ones i planted haven't broke ground yet

Here's an updated picture of how my Tucson hops are going.

So far my hops are still just hanging in there. The extreme summer heat really beat them up. Although now that it is starting to cool down some more, it looks like my vines may be making a come back. I got about a half an ounce of cascades but that's it so far. I'm hoping that maybe next year, or maybe even during our winter the plant will do better. Only time will tell. I'll post up some pics of their progress after work.

Started growing them this spring, and so far doing well. Found what looks to be wild hops growing in a canyon up north. Will head back asap to check them out again this year.

I live in Gilbert, and I am planning on planting 4 plants next Fall (1 year from now). Burpee Seeds (www.burpee.com) has 4 Hop varieties available - Cascade, Centennial, Chinook and Mt. Hood. I am currently learning about cross pollination, and in year 2 of growth I'm going to cross pollinate the hops to create my own hybrid hop variety for my Private Select IPA.

Crossing Fingers