I started growing hops at my parents’ home in Chicago in 2008. In the summer of 2011 we moved them to Michigan and I built this trellis:
Now that it’s time for the trellis to find a new home, I’m writing up my design for posterity. Notable aspects include that it can be harvested without ascending a ladder and that the top is mounted on a tree.
Each of the three hop plants (Cascade, Mt. Hood, Centennial) has its own starting frame. It runs up the yellow chain for 5 feet, then starts climbing a line up into the trees:
The frames are a 5 foot tall 4″ x 4″ vertical post with a short 2″ x 4″ crossbar at the bottom and a longer one at the top. The ends of the bottom and top crossbars are connected by chains, allowing the hops to spread laterally as they grow out and up to the top crossbar. The chains are attached to metal eyelets at the top and hammered in with large galvanized staples at the bottom:
From the eyelets on the top crossbar, six synthetic rope lines (two from each base frame) run up to a steel ring hoisted in a tree, where they clip on with carabiners:
A pulley wheel is tied around a fork in the tree, and the ring is on a long synthetic line that runs through this pulley wheel. At harvesting time, the ring can be lowered from the ground, using the pulley, and the carabiners unclipped for transporting the bines to a picking area. Then the carabiners are reattached and the lines are raised again, all without use of a ladder.
The good and the bad
With 7 years of experience, I can comment on how the design worked.
The good:
- Ease of raising and lowering: not having to climb a ladder is great.
- Longevity: the entire system has held up well, including the synthetic lines, which I never took in for the winter. I don’t think jute or a similar natural twine would have lasted. One wood staple came out from a frame, which is an easy fix.
The bad:
- Shallow climbing angle. I should have mounted the ring higher in a tree, kept the lines tighter, or planted the hops closer to the tree. As it was, the bottom of the climbing lines flattened out under the weight of the plant and the hops needed some help to grow in the right direction. Manual training of hop plants is not uncommon, but I think a steeper climb would have avoided this.
- Mowing around the trellises was tricky, both around the bases and under the lines. This meant grass and other unwanted vegetation encroached on the hops.
- I was afraid I’d get tangled in the lines while sledding in my yard; this never happened, but could have.