Beer Forum

Today has been a windy day. I decided to check my plants an noticed that one of the bines was damaged. It appears to be a burn mark from where the bine rubbed against the jute twine. There is enough of a wear that you can see into the stalk of the bine. Is this destined to be a dead bine or is it possible that it will heal over. Also, is it possible to cover the would with something?

I have had this happen in the past too. Typically the bine will heal leaving a darker/brown spot where the damage used to be.

I had this same symptom on my hops (Nugget, first year planting), and It seemed to spread, though at the time I thought that it was my imagination (I didn't have a clear cause like a big wind storm or anything).

I went away for the fourth of july and came back to a wilted near-dead bine. I looked at the base and there was a similar kind of damage at the base, but more severe. There was no wind over the weekend, and so I'm thinking that it is a pest problem. I have two adjacent mounds with Cascade and Willamette, both same age, and neither of them are showing any damage.

Just stay vigilant, you may want to consider some anti-pest spray or other action to prevent the spread. I have no direct evidence that this is pest related, but just a heads up, maybe others have a similar story. I plan on making a nicotine based spray this week and coating every inch of my remaining bines as a preventative measure.

Has anyone else had a problem like this?

I really don't see why this is a problem at all with hop plants. I had some stupid animal, probably a deer, come and eat off all of my three main fuggle bines. I was all pissed off at first but then it started to grow new shoots and I trained those off branch shoots up the vine instead. So far so good, my fuggle is only a bit behind my best plants, my saaz and cascade. I think the earlier in the season this happens the better because my chinook got destroyed by an animal really early (under a ft tall) and came back really strong in a week. If it is mold/mildew or tiny aphids I could see why this could be a problem but hops are like weeds they will keep coming back and with force.