Free hops seeds

[delzep]

Tried to put this on the NHC twitter but don't think it worked (I'm new to twitter...haven't a clue  )

Meantime brewery in London are giving away free hops seed starter kits. Maybe if you ask nicely they'll post them?

http://www.meantimebrewing.com/age-screener/?returnto=%2Fnews-events%2Fnews%2Fhops-in-a-box

[M3talDave]

I tweeted them and they posted me some.

[Taf]

There's doesn't seem to be any mention of what variety they are, and I'd be dubious as to whether they are female seeds, which is what you need. If you want to get into hop growing I would reccoment getting some rhizomes, as they grow and produce much faster, and you should know what variety that you are growing and that it is female.

[Will_D]

Please be careful if growing from seed:

The male hop is classed as an illegal weed under the 1936 Noxious Weeds Act:

"Ragwort, Thistle, Dock, Common Barberry, Male Wild Hop and Spring Wild Oat are scheduled as noxious weeds under the Noxious Weeds Act 1936. Any person responsible for land on which these weeks are growing is liable, upon conviction, to be fined. "

They are probably a waste of time and space as you don't know what the parents were! or what variety!

Order in some rhizomes or get some from the NHC. In the summer I will have some "cuttings" ready for planting then and you will be ready for next year.

[LordEoin]

I agree. I was looking for seeds/cuttings/rhizomes and settled for a couple of rhizomes from Germany.
They arrived a bit broken but they're already sprouting away mad.
Any reviews I've seen for seeds were great as a novelty, but otherwise not very practical.
Although... Free seeds? You've nothing to lose provided you can recognise and kill the males on time. 

Although law, I wouldn't be too worried about the Noxious Weeds Act, which was made to replace The Weeds and Agricultural Seeds (Ireland) Act, (1909) in 1936
Charlie Haughey added the 'Male Wild Hop Plant' order to the aging 'noxious weeds act' in 1965 when he was Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries.
Any of the 'weeds' can be removed from the list if brought to the dáil by the the current minister.

The scariest thing about this act is that it gives the Gardaí or any inspector the right to enter your property to poke about if he has any reasonable suspicion that you have one of the plants growing.
Garda: "Hmm, I don't have any reason to poke about this property. Although.. I do believe I see a Dock leaf over there!"...
Then if they find a dock leaf or a thistle etc, they can enter 'with or without workmen, horses, or machines'.

These must be some pretty hardcore weeds we're talking about here..

Docks can be found pretty much anywhere the grass is not cut, while thistles and barberry can be found in any old patch of waste land and are often planted as shrubs
All can be eaten/brewed (and barberry has medicinal uses for the liver).

In the unlikely event that the gardaí were informed about your male hops, you'd most likely avoid any charges by arguing that you are not growing WILD hop plants.
You could also grow any of the weeds on someone else's land to avoid blame.
But it's probably not worth the effort, as the fine is 'not exceeding twenty pounds' anyway...

You probably won't make any friends by growing male hop plants though... You'd be blamed for any seeds that develop in other people's females for miles around.

For reference, here's a few recipes for these 'noxious' weeds:
Thistle, dandelion and rose Wine
Barberries in cooking
Stuffed Dock Leaves

I suppose they at least got the act right with ragwort....
Or wait, no.
Ragwort is like a natural viagra with proven anti-carcenogenic properties, can be applied directly to ease sciatic pain in knuckles and can help women with irregular periods. pretty funky herb really.

The only reason this act exists is to protect horses, cows and sheep who shouldnt eat these things.

Oh yeah, and I forgot hops...
Like their cousin Cannabis, they have a plethora of uses in medicine including treating insomnia, as an antibiotic, an anti-inflammatory (arthritis), dandruff treatment, etc, and the shoots and leaves can be eaten.

I can only assume that wild male hops were added to the act to protect our now non-existent hop farmers or maybe they don't agree with livestock like the others - although hops can also be used as a herb to calm and focus horses (ref).

[Padraic]

I agree. I was looking for seeds/cuttings/rhizomes and settled for a couple of rhizomes from Germany.
They arrived a bit broken but they're already sprouting away mad.
Any reviews I've seen for seeds were great as a novelty, but otherwise not very practical.
Although... Free seeds? You've nothing to lose provided you can recognise and kill the males on time. 

Although law, I wouldn't be too worried about the Noxious Weeds Act, which was made to replace The Weeds and Agricultural Seeds (Ireland) Act, (1909) in 1936
Charlie Haughey added the 'Male Wild Hop Plant' order to the aging 'noxious weeds act' in 1965 when he was Minister for Agriculture and Fisheries.
Any of the 'weeds' can be removed from the list if brought to the dáil by the the current minister.

The scariest thing about this act is that it gives the Gardaí or any inspector the right to enter your property to poke about if he has any reasonable suspicion that you have one of the plants growing.
Garda: "Hmm, I don't have any reason to poke about this property. Although.. I do believe I see a Dock leaf over there!"...
Then if they find a dock leaf or a thistle etc, they can enter 'with or without workmen, horses, or machines'.

These must be some pretty hardcore weeds we're talking about here..

Docks can be found pretty much anywhere the grass is not cut, while thistles and barberry can be found in any old patch of waste land and are often planted as shrubs
All can be eaten/brewed (and barberry has medicinal uses for the liver).

In the unlikely event that the gardaí were informed about your male hops, you'd most likely avoid any charges by arguing that you are not growing WILD hop plants.
You could also grow any of the weeds on someone else's land to avoid blame.
But it's probably not worth the effort, as the fine is 'not exceeding twenty pounds' anyway...

You probably won't make any friends by growing male hop plants though... You'd be blamed for any seeds that develop in other people's females for miles around.

For reference, here's a few recipes for these 'noxious' weeds:
Thistle, dandelion and rose Wine
Barberries in cooking
Stuffed Dock Leaves

I suppose they at least got the act right with ragwort....
Or wait, no.
Ragwort is like a natural viagra with proven anti-carcenogenic properties, can be applied directly to ease sciatic pain in knuckles and can help women with irregular periods. pretty funky herb really.

The only reason this act exists is to protect horses, cows and sheep who shouldnt eat these things.

Oh yeah, and I forgot hops...
Like their cousin Cannabis, they have a plethora of uses in medicine including treating insomnia, as an antibiotic, an anti-inflammatory (arthritis), dandruff treatment, etc, and the shoots and leaves can be eaten.

I can only assume that wild male hops were added to the act to protect our now non-existent hop farmers or maybe they don't agree with livestock like the others - although hops can also be used as a herb to calm and focus horses (ref).

4 a.m. post of the year?? It's interesting that it specifies wild male hops (This mean's we can start a hop breeding program!!)

Dock leaves were used anytime we got stung by nettles(another plant you can brew with), don't ask me the science, by rubbing the leaves on your skin the sting was eased.

[M3talDave]

I can't remember what variety they are, but Meantime did mention in on twitter.  I think it could have been Kent Goldings, but can't be sure.  A quick tweet would clear that up. 

As for not recognising the males, female plants will be identifiable in the pre-flowering stage.  Males can be pulled up then. 

There's no real harm in having male plants except that your female cones will have seeds in them, which I'm sure we've all seen before in leaf hops from time to time.  The main drawback is that the female plant will use some of her energy in producing the seeds that would be better used in producing alphas and oils/resins for aroma.

[Tom]

Lord Eoin, what a POST!

I've been promised some hop seeds, and I look forward to developing a new hop variety, for which I already have a series of names.

So, given that they are releasing 12,000 packets of seeds, and maybe there's 5 seeds per packet, and half are male, that leaves 30,000 seedlings. Statistically (from the Wye college, where they release I think 1 hop from aout 15,000 cultivated seedlings) we can expect two fantastic new hop varieties, and shit-loads of duffers to spread verticullum wilt. Nice!

Having said that, I can't wait to plant mine.

Edit: Kent Fuggles, BTW.

[LordEoin]

I can't figure Twitter out... Stupid technology.
Ah well, i'll facebook them or live without 

[JD]

I'm not an expert on hops nor on their cultivation, but, is it not the case that hops are propagated by rhisome cuttings rather than seeds. Is it not the case that, just like apples, the seeds harvested from a Fuggles hop, say, will not give produce a Fuggles hop plant? Is it not the case that, instead, it will produce some new hybrid never before seen.

Rhisomes are the safe and sure way to go, especially if brewing is the aim.

/J

[LordEoin]

As far as I'm aware, the seeds might give you the same variety, depending on what the mother and father plants were.
So you might end up with fuggles, or you might end up with some halfcast.
But either way, it will still be a nice looking plant.
If it ends up being a female, you should still get good decorative cones that'll also be good for herbal remebies and you could even end up with a very special and unique hop variety for beer.


If it does work out to be a variety you want to keep, then you can keep it pure by propegation by cuttings or rhizomes like this
I'm no expert either, but it's how i do it with raspberries and it's aparently very similar.