For the last year or so I've been composting. I found the design for a wooden box in a "This Old House" magazine and thought it would be a good idea to start doing it with all our scrap fruits, veggies, coffee grounds and egg shells. I also put all my spent grains and used to put in my yeast before I began harvesting it.
So this morning I went out and put a few shovels full of the compost (which was nice and dark after months of decomposition) on the hops and a bunch of other plants in the yard. I'm excited to see what it does for all the plants over the next few weeks. I was debating doing another batch of the epsom salt and blood meal cocktail but figured let me see how this works before adding more nutrients.
Its been so hot here in Southwest Ohio and I've watered the hops every other day. The seems to really enjoy the heat.
Saturday, July 16, 2011
Sunday, July 10, 2011
Hops - Maybe I was wrong about the burrs
My last post mentioned that I thought I had burrs. The more and more I look at them I'm starting to think that maybe I was wrong. What I thought was burrs just continues to grow leaves and filling out the bines. The Mt. Hood which had the "burrs" continues to grow and fill out with no signs of a flower. Of course I'll continue to watch it, but I probably jumped the gun for burr production. :(
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Hops - Burrs that Jingle Jangle Jingle
Honestly, a week or so ago I wasn't sure what the progression of hops growth was. So I looked it up and found a picture of what to look for in burr production. Little did I know, I actually had some (or at least I believe they are). I went out and saw that pretty much all the plants are showing some signs of burrs with the Mt. Hood doing the best.
From the pictures I saw and reading, they looks like little off shoots from the vine right underneath the leaves. Now we'll have to wait and see what happens next!
Brew Day - Cream Ale #2 - Swamp Cooler
A friend of mine was really interested to see how homebrewing worked, so we decided to brew up the Cream Ale since what I had left of the first batch was quickly crushed at a party a few weeks ago. He asked a ton of questions and I may have converted him. Time will tell!
Pretty standard brew day with all of it going as planned. I have a rather detailed checklist that I use for my brew day and I found that now that I have a few AG batches in that I didn't look at it often. It was a good feeling to know that I'm becoming so comfortble with the process and that I can start to focus on refining it.
If you are interested in the recipe, you can find it here. The only thing I did different was add a 1/8 lb of Golden Light DME at 30 mins. I did this because I use the DME to make starters and there wasn't enough to make another starter and it was getting older, so instead of just tossing it, decided to add it to the wort.
Temperature in my storage area were hanging out near 70 and I'd like to ferment a cooler. Temperatures are also supposed to climb to near 90 into the week so I figured I'd set up a swamp cooler so I could keep the beer at a constant temperature.
Pretty standard brew day with all of it going as planned. I have a rather detailed checklist that I use for my brew day and I found that now that I have a few AG batches in that I didn't look at it often. It was a good feeling to know that I'm becoming so comfortble with the process and that I can start to focus on refining it.
If you are interested in the recipe, you can find it here. The only thing I did different was add a 1/8 lb of Golden Light DME at 30 mins. I did this because I use the DME to make starters and there wasn't enough to make another starter and it was getting older, so instead of just tossing it, decided to add it to the wort.
Temperature in my storage area were hanging out near 70 and I'd like to ferment a cooler. Temperatures are also supposed to climb to near 90 into the week so I figured I'd set up a swamp cooler so I could keep the beer at a constant temperature.
Checked it this morning and we had good activity in th airlock and the beer was sitting around 67ish. I'm happy with that. I'm monitor the temps and put a frozen quart jug in the tub if needed to keep the water cool.
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
Hops - Nutrient Deficient?
Its been around two months since my hops went into the ground. The Cascade and Mt. Hood are not doing to bad, but the Willamette and U.S. Tettnang are definitely lagging behind. I took a look in "The Hombrewers Garden" to see what my next steps are as the season continues. There was a section on nutrient deficiencies that caught my eye.
Most of my plants have yellow leaves toward the bottom and in some cases like the Tettnang it is starting to climb up the vine. I also feel like the plants growth has slowed down a lot even though you'd think this would be the time for them to shine.
The book suggest for stunted growth and yellow leaves before the end of the season to add nitrogen. Forms of nitrogen are fresh compost, manure, or fertilizers like fish emulsion or blood meal.
For lower leaves that turn yellow and then brown and start to die up the vine that the soil may be lacking magnesium. Epsom salt is a good source of magnesium.
Both of these seem to be my issues. So I did some research on the web to find out how much of the nutrients I would need to add. I decided to go with fish emulsion (which I found at Lowes) and an epsom salt combination as suggested by one forum. I used a water solution of 1 tablespoon fish emulsion fertilizer (per the label) and 1/4 tsp epsom salt per gallon of water and made two gallons (doubled the nutrients). The post said "Magnesium is the first micronutrient that hops crave when the pH of their root environment is too high. If you are only tending a small hop garden, try using fish emulsion with your water to acidify it. This will make magnesium in your soil more available to the plants."
We'll see over the next few weeks if I've made the right call by adding these nutrients. More to come.....
Most of my plants have yellow leaves toward the bottom and in some cases like the Tettnang it is starting to climb up the vine. I also feel like the plants growth has slowed down a lot even though you'd think this would be the time for them to shine.
The book suggest for stunted growth and yellow leaves before the end of the season to add nitrogen. Forms of nitrogen are fresh compost, manure, or fertilizers like fish emulsion or blood meal.
For lower leaves that turn yellow and then brown and start to die up the vine that the soil may be lacking magnesium. Epsom salt is a good source of magnesium.
Both of these seem to be my issues. So I did some research on the web to find out how much of the nutrients I would need to add. I decided to go with fish emulsion (which I found at Lowes) and an epsom salt combination as suggested by one forum. I used a water solution of 1 tablespoon fish emulsion fertilizer (per the label) and 1/4 tsp epsom salt per gallon of water and made two gallons (doubled the nutrients). The post said "Magnesium is the first micronutrient that hops crave when the pH of their root environment is too high. If you are only tending a small hop garden, try using fish emulsion with your water to acidify it. This will make magnesium in your soil more available to the plants."
We'll see over the next few weeks if I've made the right call by adding these nutrients. More to come.....
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