Tess Weigand Joshua Brock
Happy Valley Hop Yard is a one
acre yard in Coburn that has been
providing local breweries with hops
for three years. Currently growing
Cascade, Centennial, and Chinook.
Tess has a degree in agronomy from
Penn State and works as an
inspector and certification specialist
for PCO.
Joshua is the owner-operator of
Hoffman Appalachian Farm, located
in Saint Marys (Elk County), PA.
Starting in 2015 with 30 hops
rhizomes, and now with a recently
completed 1 acre/450+ plant
expansion, Hoffman Appalachian
Farm is entering their 3rd year of
growing five varieties of hops all for
their local brewery Straub Brewery.
Commonwealth Hops
We want to bring hop Farmer’s finished products to the
Commonwealth’s growing number of craft breweries efficiently and
cost-effectively.
We Provide…
Capital-intensive infrastructure and expertise
To Reduce…
Instability in local hops supply
And…
To bolster the growth of a locally sourced, consistent and
quality hop market in Pennsylvania!
Take the Hassel Out of Harvesting! Let us:
Harvest, Pelletize, Package, Consult, and bulk order your hopyard
supplies
Set yourself up for success!
Site selection
Soil testing
Varietal pre-planning with
clients
Networking
Trellis design
Establishing Your Yard
Soil preferences- pH of 5.5-8, well drained, lots of organic
matter, inter-row planning (soil testing!)
Planting- plant spacing within your trellis and by variety
Soil amendments pre-planting
Irrigation
Growing Season
Training bines-(usually mid-April in central PA), clockwise
Pruning/disease prevention- bine selection and leaf removal
Weed suppression- fabrics, torches, tilling
Constant scouting for pest/disease
Fertility/irrigation- need 30inches during the growing
season (16gallons/week/plant)
A mature yard of 1 acre can consume between 100 and 240
pounds of N during the growing season, but only 10% before
May. Most occurs during June.
Harvest
Knowing when to harvest is key. This will differ by variety
Know your moisture content/test for DM
Cone development will help you learn when you should
start testing
Mechanical vs. Hand Harvest
Drying
Unless you (or your buddy or your favorite brewery) is
using your hops fresh / wet / green, they must be dried
Capturing the essence of that 80% moisture level is critical!
Need to be dried quickly and in a controlled fashion
Heat, light, oxygen are our enemies
Drying for whole cone form or pellets?
Drying – Testing for
Harvest
Hops should be dried to a moisture content of 8% - 10%
Too much moisture = spoilage and mold growth
Over drying = lose aroma compounds, cones shatter,
spontaneous combustion
Beneficial to remove moisture quickly with relatively low
heat
Roughly 135F for approximately 8-10 hours
We are seeking a uniformly dry hop bed
Drying – Testing for
Harvest
Testing moisture content while drying
Collect fresh sample (100g, several side arms), weigh them and
dry down to 0% moisture.
NOTE: As noted, each variety is ready at different times. Do not mix
samples when testing for moisture content. You can dry then
concurrently, just in different trays
When weighing, use a scale that goes to 10ths of a gram
Either “tare out” the weight of the container of hops or remember
to subtract that weight out from your calculation
Drying hops…
Overnight in a food dehydrator at 140 – 150F
In a Koster Moisture Tester
Microwave oven (remove and stir contents every minute or so to
prevent scorching)
Drying – Testing for
Harvest
Once at stable weight, hops are at 0% moisture
Weigh dry hops, record in grams, calculate % dry matter…
Hops should be dried down to 8-12% moisture (88-92% dry
matter)
Drying – Testing In Oast
Small subsample used to determine moisture content of a
large oast
Use porous, mesh bag – large enough for several handfuls of
hop cones
Weigh bag in grams, record
Subsample to equal 100g
Place mesh bag into center of oast
As we know weight of sample, we can calculate eight at 92%
dry matter (8% moisture)
Drying – Testing In Oast
UVM - Determining Hop Harvest Moisture and Ideal Storage Dry Matter
Packaging
How long will hops last?
”It depends” ;-)
Kept cold and oxygen free, can last 1-2 years
Hops brokers will sell pelletized and vacuum-sealed hops from 2-
3 seasons ago
Commercial breweries can use last year’s crop into current harvest
Hops considered “bad” until they get below 50% or original a-acid
value…”cheesy” aroma
Storage stability is determined by measuring the loss of alpha-
acids after a set standard temperature and time
Packaging – Home brewing
or small brewery
Vacuum packing / inert-gas with oxygen barrier
“Boiling bag” – clear, lamination of two type of plastic
Inner layer food-grade polyethylene
Not a great oxygen barrier, but does seal well with heat
Outer layer mylar or nylon
Multi-layered aluminum pack (“foil bag” or “pouch”)
Protects hops from exposure to light and oxygen
Layer of aluminum, increases barrier protection
Doubles cost
Pelletizing
Pellets prevalent in brewing as they deteriorate more slowly
than whole hops
Microbrewers prefer them because…
Easier to remove from the wort (whirlpool separator)
Take up less storage space
Hammer-milled into a powder and the powder
subsequently pelletized by passing through a conventional
pellet die
One pound of hop cones can yield about 10 to 12 ounces of
pellets
Pelletizing
Contain all the vegetative and lupulin material of raw leaf
hops
Can be used as a full replacement for leaf hops in the
brewing process
On average the equivalent amount of hops pellets can
impart 10-15% more bitterness than whole leaf hops
Hops pellets are generally packaged under vacuum or in an
inert gas such as nitrogen to reduce the rate of deterioration
Their lighter weight and compressed state also make them
easier to store and less susceptible to spoilage
Storage
For optimum preservation of hop’s qualities, they should be
stored as cold as possible (30 to -5 degrees F)
Slows oxidation process
Precious hop oils including both aromatic and bittering oils
tend to break down over time, and old hops will lose aroma,
flavor and bitterness as they age
Stale hops will take on a cheesy or skunky flavor that can
ruin your beer
Remember thy enemies: heat, light and oxygen
Source: Beersmith.com
Storage
The speed of aging varies by hop variety
The aging rate for a particular variety is measures using the
Hop Storage Index (HSI) - amount of hops alpha acid
potential lost in 6 months when the hops are stored at a
constant temperature of 68F
Hops will last over three times as long as their HSI would
indicate if frozen and stored properly
For example a hops with a starting alpha of 10% and HSI of
25% stored for 6 months would lose 25% of its alpha potential,
resulting in an new alpha rating of 7.5% if stored at 68F
The same hops stored for 6 months at 28F (-2C) would only
lose 10% of its alpha acids leaving it at 9% alpha content
Source: Beersmith.com
Sources
“Hops Harvest Moisture Determination"
http://www.uvm.edu/extension/cropsoil/wp-
content/uploads/Hop_harvest_fact_sheet.pdf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TfUYXu4-0-s
”Brewing Hops Storage: Preserving Precious Hops”
http://beersmith.com/blog/2008/04/15/brewing-hops-
storage-preserving-precious-hops/
“Hop Storage: How to Get - and Keep - Your Hops'
Optimum Value”
https://www.morebeer.com/brewingtechniques/library/bac
kissues/issue2.1/garetz.html
Sources
“Post-Harvest Hop Quality”
Tim Kostelecky, John I. Haas, Inc. – Yakima, WA
http://www.uvm.edu/extension/cropsoil/wp-
content/uploads/VT-Hop-Conf-Kostelecky.pdf
“3 Things Every Brewer Should Know About Hops and Food
Safety”
https://hopdoctor.wordpress.com/2016/10/12/3-things-every-
brewer-should-know-about-hops-and-food-safety/
“The Business of Hops: Craft Professionals Share Advice From
Farming to Contracting”
https://www.craftbrewingbusiness.com/ingredients-
supplies/business-hops-beer-advice-farming-contracting/
Site Selection and Trellis Design
Site select: chose places with full sun, well drained, away from trees that will hold morning mist/dew. Evaluate what is in the soil currently and the feasibility of setting up structure there. You’ll have to dig at least three feet down.
Talk about where to source you plants from. We can provide growers after the talk.
Chose your trellis design, discuss differences in height/ spacing and the options here. Talk about materials and pricing. See if there will be a board for me to draw on. List of things youll need include, height of posts (20ft abouve soil) locust etc metal, cable, anchors, coir, attachemnts
Describe V trellising and how that allows for air flow and light penetration, and more growing space. Compared to just straight up and down.
Once the yard is planned on paper and you’ve got it all down, time to put in the infrastructure and plants. Talk about plant and varietal sourcing. Talk about how they are perennials, soil they prefer, spacing/planting/etc- what should go in between your rows grass etc, and how wide should they be, this depends on your equiptment.
Talk about soil prep- all from soil tests. Be careful of using too much compost because of salt buildup. Hops perfer soils with adequate phosphorus and potassium, def check for boron. Healthy plants fend disease easier and that starts during early growth.
Irrigation/fert. No nitrogen past june because of budding- talk about omri lsited materials, these plants can be grown organically, trellising tak about timing, clockwise wrapping. Then talk about weed suppression, torches,
Water needs: 30 inches, NE usually gets 20
Fertility: regimne can be 120lb application in the spring and another 120 through mid-july, lots of N usually means higher yield but too much means that the plants will have more vegetaive growth and make it more suceeplie to diseas. to hops and not good for envoironment
Talk about tplant development. They grow side armssthat will produce buds in june. They can grow up to a foot a day.
Common Pests and Diseases:
Downy Mildew- Prevent by good air flow and no standing water and by good planning/site selection, healthy plants. Prevention is 9/10ths of the game, but you will get it. Scout often to catch early, remove infected leaves immediately from yard, do not compost. Then instituate spray regimine. Actinvovate is a good OMRI listed material but there are a few others, rotate your use.
Japanese Beetles- commonly feed on leaves, can wipe out entire yard. Will also feed on cones. Can use lure traps (talk about proper use, outside the yard downwiind, nefore they get there) or milky spore. They overwinter in the soil. Trap cropping could also work. Good luck
Spider Mites and Aphids- can appear early and when it is hot and dry spider mites feed on underside of leaves, control through prevention by healthy plants and also spraying, again tehre are omri listed materials like soaps, etc.
Hops get common disease just like in vegetable production. They are most succepible when the cones, the marketbale part the hop is present.
Harvesting: knowing when to harvest is a learned art. Once a bine is cut down or cone removed it immediately degrading in quality. Harvesting by hand isnt feasible for more than a few years. There are harvesters availbela dn also custom harvesting. You can test for moisture to know when to harvest. 20-25% DM at harvest time.
Overwinter prep: cut them down in fall and then cover