I sent Doug Donelan of New Zealand Hops a quick email as I was interested in finding out the order New Zealand Hops were harvested. This is what he had to share with me:
“Order depends on area, growers closer to the coast pick Cascade first then Pacifica where as further inland Cascade follows Pacifica. Designation is given as early, mid, late season. The earliest are the English types generally Fuggle, Golding etc…most northern varieties are early, Styrian Goldings were picked this week. Age changes things as well, first year plants generally mature early as well but will settle into the season 2nd year.”
For New Zealand Varieties it’s a bit like this.
Early: (1st week March) Pacifica, Motueka, Riwaka
Mid: (2nd/3rd week March) Wakatu, Nelson Sauvin, Rakau, Dr Rudi, Southern Cross, Wai-iti, Kohatu, Pacific Gem, Pacific Jade.
Late: ( End of March) Sticklebract, Waimea, Green Bullet.
(we are only talking about a 4 week period to harvest 15 NZ varieties, 8 Northern Varieties plus Trials)
“Not all growers grow all varieties but all need to have a mix to ensure they can optimise the picking windows to stretch across the season. They also can’t be too heavy on one variety over another as the picking windows can’t overlap too closely.”
Cheers Doug. Really appreciate your time (especially at this time of year), and this interesting information.
Heres an old article on Hop production that I found quite interesting:
http://www.nzhops.co.nz/articles/articles.html
Would be great to see an update for 2013
– Spig