The Minnesota Home Brewers Association had a great turnout at Mighty Axe Hops this passed Saturday.
Eric Sannerud, a co-founder of Mighty Axe Hops played host and tour guide for the club. Eric showed the club the way their farm operates now and discussed how they hope to grow in the future. Currently Mighty Axe is growing exclusively Cascade hops and is working on trying to determine exactly how their plants behave on their farm. One area of the farm has hops attempting to grown diagonally, as opposed to the traditional method of growing them straight up.
In the main area of the farm, all the hope plants are in their first year and are showing great signs of growth. Eric discussed how even though all the watering and fertalizing is the same across all plants, some of the new plants are about 6 feet tall now and very poky while another plant right next door is over 20 feet tall and already showing signs of producing the ‘puff-balls’ that will turn into hop cones!
The photos below are from Dave Royer and Al Boyce
Photos by Dave Royer and Al Boyce