OVHA Chat

Something strange happened to me yesterday morning. I was working out in the middle of the boonies about 30 miles north of Terre Haute, when I noticed something growing in the top of a tree.



There are no houses anywhere around this place. I wonder, is there such a thing as wild hops? I just can't imagine anyone planting hops here.

They had a great aroma, but unfortunately they were too old to harvest, but next year....................

Surely you harvest enough to make one batch.

Unfortunately not. The greenish hops in the close-up were the only ones that I saw that were not totally dried up.

Root cuttings.

I revisited the hop tree the middle of July and was very disturbed to find thousands of Japanese Beetles swarming around the hops. They were eating only the hops, ignoring all the other vegetation completely.

I stopped by today expecting the worst, but was pleasantly surprised when I managed to collect what should be enough to flavor a batch or two.

that's because it's magic...

Hops have grown wild since acient times. The Greeks mentioned hops and the Romans discussed eating hop stems as a delicacy. There is a source of a monastary collecting wild hops, first record for use in beer, around 760 AD if my memory serves me correctly. Some were delivered as a tithe but a record was made allowing the monk to go and collect as much more from the wild as needed to make beer.