Growing hops advice please

[growinghops]

The 3 foot rule is the minimum distance between like varieties of hops. Five feet is the minimum for different varieties of hops. Assuming you are containing the hop rhizomes from spreading towards a different hop variety, you also have to watch the bines so their lateral growth does not intermingle with adjacent bines.

Magnum stay close to their bine where Cascades like to sprawl out. See pic:


Left to right is Nugget, Magnum and Cascade. 1 rope for each, 3 bines per rope. Notice how the magnum is compact and the Nugget and especially the Cascade are bushing out sideways. This is where the distance between bines comes into play. The Cascade hop bines will easily intermingle with nearby bines and if they are different varieties, you will have a hard time separating them at harvest.

[rwcbeerclub]

What is the down side of intermingling?

[Oktober]

If they intermingle, you might have some difficulty seperating the cones by variety when you harvest (i.e. Cascade in your Magnum, etc). If they interweave all together, you'll just have a clump of hops and might have a hard time distinguishing one variety from another.

-Okt

[Hessian Lake]

That you may not know which hop you have. Basically, if they look the same (some varieties look different) you have a 50/50 chance of being right when you guess.

[rwcbeerclub]

So no real risk to the plant, just to the sorting. I am lucky that I train each bine onto it's own lateral wire so it is not an issue. I was just following up because of the post about 3' distance. Thanks again.

[Hessian Lake]

So no real risk to the plant, just to the sorting. I am lucky that I train each bine onto it's own lateral wire so it is not an issue. I was just following up because of the post about 3' distance. Thanks again.

Correct, at least as far as I'm aware. Of course one plant will absorb soil nutrients away from its neighboring plants however the variety wouldn't much matter. Some varieties grow better within a specific environment/conditions.

EDIT: Even if you have them trained up one wire, as they grow the bines will have off-shoots that will extend laterally toward its neighboring plants' bine. If it grows poorly or if you can reach and constantly re-train the lateral bines this might not be an issue.