Clip the tip or Not? Thoughts

[Retrofit]

3rd year hop grower. Daily reader, regular poster.

On the topic of clipping the tips, I'm neutral.

My 2nd year plants are planted in a row in a raised garden. I've got a 12.5 tall trellis- it telescopes I could make it taller, but I think my neighbors would hate me (again) and I question it's structural strength after 12'.

My Newport is about 14' tall and I've got three other hops that are about 12' tall. I'm thinking, it's the end of May and 1/4 of my hops are about to extend past my trellis.

Do I clip them to try to lower their height, hope they get bushy and give me some cones? Do I let them grow, fall back down on themselves, make a huge mess, and... I dunno- I'm entering new territory.

Thoughts?

 

[B-Hoppy]

I would just clip a few and let the others free range. I don't know what all you have planted but I would 'clip/not clip' varieties that are more equally vigorous. That may give you a more accurate trial rather than clipping a Cascade and not clipping a Fuggle. Just a suggestion - you might hit on something.

 

[Retrofit]

You've got a good point, not all my plants are breaking 14', not all have incredibly thick strong bines. Let me go out tomorrow and get a better grasp of who's doing what.

What got me thinking about this is I've seen on line a report on professional 10' trellis system. If I can find it, I"ll link to it. I know tradition has it, taller is better, but I'm not a pro. I've got nothing to lose. Maybe some yield, but I still see that as nothing to lose cause right now I've got no hops. Anyway, I'll measure hop bines and types and report back in. Maybe I can have strong healthy bines that are roughly 12/14' tall???

 

[B-Hoppy]

There are quite a few 'dwarf' hop varieties out there which some commercial hop growers are trying to utilize to help cut down on production costs - not sure how well it's going. Not so much here but I guess they've been doing it for a while in the U.K. though.

 

[Randar]

There are quite a few 'dwarf' hop varieties out there which some commercial hop growers are trying to utilize to help cut down on production costs - not sure how well it's going. Not so much here but I guess they've been doing it for a while in the U.K. though.

Summit is one... Super high AA and dwarf.

As for Retro clipping the growth tip? I haven't seen that to be terribly effective in stopping vertical growth or encouraging side-arm and spur production, but admittedly I have only tried it a couple times and don't have a lot of data to support that opinion.

 

[nwmarach]

I actually just attended a hops 101 seminar through Gorst Valley Hops this last weekend and if I remember correctly when the same question was asked, they said - if the tips are clipped then you will get two more shoots sent out from the next node and it will keep being a problem. That and the plant itself will keep putting energy in growing new shoots and not cones. Also depending on the trellis height (I think they said 10 ft) the hops will keep trying to grow up and end up flopping on itself because it thinks it is not high enough. So no matter what you do (without training is horizontally) it's going to be a mess. They suggested that you have a 16' minimum trellis and even with high trellises (20 ft) hops can grow up over it, but will eventually shut down the vertical growth.

As for Dwarf varieties they said that outside of hops families in the PNW only one other place in Michigan has a license to grow dwarfs (commercially) in the US. So I have a feeling that getting your hands on some of those plants would be down right difficult.

Now this information they were giving was for small scale commercial production, but take it for what it's worth.

 

[Randar]

I actually just attended a hops 101 seminar through Gorst Valley Hops this last weekend and if I remember correctly when the same question was asked, they said - if the tips are clipped then you will get two more shoots sent out from the next node and it will keep being a problem. That and the plant itself will keep putting energy in growing new shoots and not cones. Also depending on the trellis height (I think they said 10 ft) the hops will keep trying to grow up and end up flopping on itself because it thinks it is not high enough. So no matter what you do (without training is horizontally) it's going to be a mess. They suggested that you have a 16' minimum trellis and even with high trellises (20 ft) hops can grow up over it, but will eventually shut down the vertical growth.

As for Dwarf varieties they said that outside of hops families in the PNW only one other place in Michigan has a license to grow dwarfs (commercially) in the US. So I have a feeling that getting your hands on some of those plants would be down right difficult.

Now this information they were giving was for small scale commercial production, but take it for what it's worth.

Thanks for the info. I had a feeling it would generate new vertical growth nodes (like it does when you trim at the crown) but have never seen it myself.

And it does appear that hops are going the way of orchard fruit breeding... new breeds are patented and licensed to growers to control the product volume/distribution. CTZ (now available once the same genetic content was verified), Amarillo, Summit... I am sure there are others.

 

[a_potter]

I had a Glacier plant that was first year last season. Leaf hoppers ate the tips off of every bine early in the spring when the plant was only about 5 feet tall. I thought it was screwed but decided to let it grow and build roots anyway. It ended up just growing sidearms at the next node like nwmarach said and grew past the top of my trellis. They seem to be pretty hard to stop once they get rolling.

 

[B-Hoppy]

The vegetative (vertical) growth usually begins to slow as we reach max. day length. At that point most all of the 'juice' goes toward cone production. I would bet that if you timed it right you may be able to increase your yield to an extent. At what point to 'pinch' is the $64 question.