Dry hopping a barley wine: how to?

[vejgaardzoo]

Im brewing a barley wine this weekend and would like to dry hop it. I've only dry hopped a beer once before - back then I racked to secondary after two weeks and let it sit in there for two weeks with the hops before bottling.

But I expect to have the barley wine in the secondary for 2-3 months and I assume that's too long for dry-hopping? - that leaving the beer on the hops for months will result in off flavors?

So what to do? throw the hops in to the secondary a couple of weeks before bottling?

[hotrod38]

What I did with my American Barleywine, is to dry hop it with 2-3 oz of pellet hops for 4-5 days...I then crash cooled it for a couple of days then I kegged it. Mine sat in the secondary for 3 months before adding the hops.

[ApresSkiBrewer]

With an American barley wine, I would dry hop towards the end of your maturation (just before you package), like hot rod did. I think that would be the easiest.

So, 3-4 weeks primary, 2-3 months bright (secondary) with 5-10 days of dry hop before packaging.

[brewinhard]

+1 to both of the above replies. Definitely let the beer mature for a few months first to clear out. Then about 1 wk. before kegging or bottling, add your hops and let the sweet aroma hit your nose after packaging and consuming! Keep in mind that with any dry hopped beer, the fresh aroma is enjoyed right away, so be sure to have a few of them as soon as they are carbonated for a delightful experience!

[vejgaardzoo]

Okay, thanks all for the good advice.

It seems that people agree on how to do this

[SacoDeToro]

Personally, I don't see the benefit to dry hopping a beer that needs notable age before reaching prime drinkability. And although I lean towards American barleywines over the English-style ones, I've never gotten any appreciable hop aroma from a b-wine that was, say 6-12 months old. While I do a whirlpool hop addition in my American b-wine, my goal is to add an extra dimension to the hop flavors, not so much aromas.