Hops have brains too

March 9, 9:17 AMBeer ExaminerCharlie Papazian

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Hop sprouts emerge.  Photo from FattyMattyBrewing

Hops are emerging from the ground as we drink our beer - today.  Every March brewers pause, take a deep breath and a healthy swallow of hop infused beer hoping the late summer and fall harvest will be a good one.  

They look like skinny asparagus coming out of the ground.  In fact you might find them on the menu as hop sprouts in some Belgian restaurants.  They emerge from a perennial root/rhizome annually, twisting, turning clockwise to follow the sun.  My mid the end of May they can be 20 feet high on wire or rope stringers reaching for the sky.  You can almost watch them grow a foot day at their peak growth spurt. 

Photo left: Hop aphids.  Freshops

Washington’s Yakima Valley is the nation’s most prolific hop growing area, but Oregon and Idaho have commercial varieties also prized by brewers.  Meanwhile homebrewers and gardeners enjoy a less commercial and more intimate relation to their homegrown hops just about everywhere in the country, where there’s sun, warmth, long days, soil nutrients and water, lots of water.

As hops emerge, so do the army of neo-prohibitionist minded pests.  Insects, fungus, beetles, viruses all conspire to attack and steal away what brewers and hop growers seek: healthy aromatic, flavorful hop harvests.

Beetles, mites, spiders are but a few enemies of hops and they are genetically programmed to seek and destroy as opportunity presents itself.

Mint to the defense !  Last year I was passed an article from John Deere’s The Furrow  titled “A Minty-fresh approach to IPM.”  The article never did explain what IPM meant, but I was told the story was about hops, so I read on.  

When plants are attacked by pests they emit what’s called “herbivore-induced plant protection odors (HIPPOs).”  That means when under attack plants have the “intelligence” to produce smells that will attract the insects that will protect them (eat the bad guys) from harmful insects.   The problem is that these HIPPOs (you’ve got to love the acronym) don’t usually get going until the plants are already infested and under duress. 

Scientists have figured out through experimentation with wintergreen oil (methyl salicylate) in both hop fields and in vineyards, that they can bring in battle ready predator bugs earlier than they’d usually arrive.  Wintergreen oil is cheap and easy to produce.  That’s a plus.   David James an entomologist at Washington State University’s Irrigated Agriculture Research and Extension Center in Prosser, Washington (I’d love to see his business card!) believes there are other plusses.

“What I think is happening is we put this out and it turns the plants on to produce their own volatiles.”  The article says his lab studies show that wintergreen oil stimulates hops to release different HIPPOs than non-exposed plants do.

Scientists continue to experiment, assessing the rate of incoming friendly armies, while also making sure they don’t “burn out” the plant’s HIPPO producing process. 

So next time you see someone having a mint julep, a mojito or popping a breath mint, show them the gate to your hop yard and offer them a glass of beer.  And explain why hops have brains.

 Friday, August 8th, 2008 · 3 comments

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