CHAPTER V 



THE CLIMATE AND SOIL FOR HOPS 



HE hop abhors continuous 

 heavy fog or too much 

 humidity in either air or soil, 

 yet so rapid a grower must 

 not suffer for want of water. 

 Light fogs two or three 

 times a week seem to favor 

 hops, and to them Flint at- 

 tributes the fine color so 

 characteristic of Pacific coast 

 hops. Winters that kill the 



root stocks are unfavorable. A climate that allows the 

 root to rest from its labor, but enables it to make an 

 early start in spring without danger from late frosts, 

 an atmosphere free from excessive clouds and humid- 

 ity, with abundant sunshine, not too dry as harvest 

 approaches, with an absence of early frosts there the 

 hop thrives and there blights, mold and lice are reduced 

 to a minimum. 



Hence the superiority of certain limited regions 

 in California. Oregon and Washington are apt to 

 have too much moist, hot weather toward harvest. 

 New York's climate is quite favorable on the average 

 of years, but winterkilling is common. A climate in 

 which corn (maize) does its best, is, in the United 

 States, about right for hops, but, as Clark truly says, a 

 great many soils and climates that are good for corn 

 are bad for hops. English yards suffer most seriously 

 from too much atmospheric moisture. The same is 

 often true in Europe. Yet the tables of humidity, tem- 



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