A few small cones are ready

There is actually quite a lot of hop cones on the Cascade and some are looking like they're probably ready to harvest, but unfortunately, they're all pretty small. I had hoped to at least get enough to add to a batch of beer for flavour and aroma but at this point, that would be purely ceremonial. Oh well, it was just the first year and wasn't really expecting to get much. I also blame the weather. This was the hottest summer on record and also one of the driest, so not the best year to attempt to grow hops. Chris Colby at BYO Magazine had problems with his hop production this year that he attributed to the heat as well.

Nice Cones

Above 100F temperatures have returned for this week. We've received a few scattered heavy storms over the past week or two, one of which brought an extremely close lightning strike that fried the motherboard on my PC. Gave both pots a thorough watering with fertilizer today at noon. The Cascade plant is continuing to develop more hop cones while the Nugget appears all but given up on them. Both plants have been putting some effort into growing side shoots again and I've been torn between pinching them off and letting them grow. In the end I've let them grow and wound them around the twine. I figured I'd let it do what it wants during the first year of growth and be more selective about pruning next year. More hope cone goodness: