Humulus lupulus or ‘wolf of the woods’ is the Latin name for the hop. It is a tall climbing plant and is “dioecious” which means that male and female plants are separate. It is the female plant which bears the hop cones required in the brewing process.
The plants are perennial (dying back and re-growing each year) and can be expected to remain productive for 10-20 years or more, sending their roots down to a depth of up to 3.75m. With the support of a matrix of wooden poles, wirework and string they can grow to a height of at least 5m. On the traditional system, the plants are tied or trained up each string in the Spring. They reach the top of the string by July and during the month they begin to flower, and their cones begin to develop. The hop cones consist of layers of soft tissue petals where the lupulin glands form and they look like large yellow pollen grains.

Hops (Humulus lupulus) are used in brewing for their aroma and bittering properties. The female flowers or strobuli, are commonly referred to as cones, and contain the acids and essential oils that impart aroma and bitterness respectively. In nearly all cases, hops are dioecious, meaning individual plants are either male or female and produce only male or female flowers. Individual female cones contain 20-60 individual flowers , while male flowers are multi-branched panicles with many tiny flowers. Male plants produce pollen that can be carried by the wind to female cones; the resulting fertilized female flowers produce seed. 

The majority of the world’s hop production is concentrated between both the northern and southern 35th and 55th parallels. While anyone can grow hops just about anywhere with the right precautions, commercial production requires conditions to be optimal. It is no coincidence that all countries that produce meaningful quantities of hops fit between these latitudes.

Hops grow best in a temperature range between 5 and 22 Celsius. The plants also tolerate a wide range of precipitation levels, easily handling as little as 12 inches and as much as 53 inches of rain per year. Hop plants require 120 days of uninterrupted frost-free days to hit maturity and love days with over 15 hours or more of sunlight. Rich soil is a must.

Whether a hop plant grows to be a tall plant, semi-tall or dwarf is controlled ultimately by dwarf genes in its DNA. The influence of these genes causes the plant to develop shorter internodes on the bine (the spacing between the nodes or leaf-growing sections) and, consequently, the plant height is shorter.
Generally, dwarf hops grow to around 8-10 feet high, whereas tall plants can reach 18 feet and higher.

Low trellis / hedgerow hop growing systems are designed to suit these shorter plants.
How do low trellis systems (aka hedgerows) differ from tall hop yards?
The support for growing dwarf plants is provided by netting which rises to heights of around 12 feet. The plants are planted closer to one another – usually about a metre apart. Generally, the plants are not trained by hand and runners (the shoots surplus to requirements) are left rather than be removed. Due to their close proximity, the hop plants’ foliage overlaps with the foliage of the neighbouring plants, forming a continuous hedgerow. Once the hop cones are ready to be picked they are mechanically stripped from the plant, leaving the majority of the plant in situ.

The Hop Plant Company does not have any organic hop plants for sale, we grow plants using conventional vegetative propagation techniques. Our plants are grown in accordance with the Plant Health Propagation Scheme (PHPS) for Hops and are Certified by the UK Animal Plant Health Agency (APHA).