Sunday, May 18, 2008

Updating the update

Well, perhaps I was premature in posting my hop update early this morning. When I went out the door to walk to church*, this is what I found across the road. You can barely see a portion of the planting crew in this photo.
Further along the way I stopped to get a picture of a hop plant itself, as I am sure there are many (read most) who have no idea what they might look like.
Looking to the sky through the trellises you can see the strings up in that portion. Just wait till August when I can describe and show the harvest and the role these strings play then.

One more factoid I heard regarding this huge planting of hops in the valley is that the investment will have been recouped by the third year. (Think many acres and acres of land, hundreds of poles per acre for all of it that was previously in some other crop, wire, string, plants, equipment much of which is specialized, and the labor to install it all.)
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*Walking to church on Sunday morning and on my days off is part of my training regimen for the 3-Day Walk. The distance is perfect, and even now, it is vital to get the walking done before the day heats up as the heat has finally come. I think we may have skipped spring weather and gone right to summer. DH is headed to the shed to pick up our window air conditioner now.

7 comments:

imac said...

Very intersting post Katney, also great photos.

david mcmahon said...

Great information. Hip hop!!

Lew said...

Count in among those that have never seen hops (that is, before they are in the beer). Dad used to plant green beans with strings for each plant, but only about as tall as he was. It made picking the beans a lot easier.

Cath said...

I had no idea what a hop plant looked like. This is a really informative post (and the previous one) - I have never seen hops grow and it is interesting to see how it is done and how long it takes.

Well done on the training too. I admire your resolve.

San said...

The way you've captured all of those lines against the sky--it's all kind of dreamy. Lovely!

Sandi McBride said...

I think lots of places we went straight to summer...tho we still have some spring days...fancy growing hops!
David sent me round...congrats on the mention in Post of the Day
Sandi

Linda said...

That is amazing. There were hops growing in the area where I grew up in Australia. We also grew them along a fence at our house.
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