Abundant Hops Harvest is Bittersweet

Attention craft beer habitués:
The good news is, the Hops crisis is over.
Bad news is, that's not entirely good news.

An overabundant crop and poor economy causing beer drinkers to go on a budget have produced a bittersweet hop harvest.

Growers were optimistic heading into the late-August harvest. The crop looked healthy and vines were stacked with cones.

But as August turned into September, the demand for hops cooled. Once quotas were met and contracts were satisfied, no spot market existed for the remainder of the crop.

Hopes were left on the vine.

"It's just an interesting harvest," said Stacy Puterbaugh of Puterbaugh Farms in Mabton. "We had great expectations when we started out and halfway through you find out there's too many."

Puterbaugh wouldn't say how many acres of hops he left in the field, but said, "Anything is significant when you can't harvest it. That's just how it goes."

Early this summer, the Washington Field Office of the National Agricultural Statistics Service expected more than 29,900 acres of hops to be harvested in Washington. The state produces about 75 percent of the nation's hops, primarily in Yakima and Benton counties.

The statistics service projected 102 million bushels would be harvested, up from 96.3 million bushels last year. An official with the statistics service said it's too early to tell if that projection was met.

Ann George, Washington Hop Commission administrator, attributes the hefty crop to an excessive amount of acres that were planted in response to the hop shortage in 2007. Thousands of additional acres were planted as brewers and dealers expected the hop-growing industry to continue expanding.

With contracts in place and additional hops in the field, the recession made itself known about a year ago. George said the economic downturn caused a dip in beer consumption, reducing the amount of hops brewers needed.

"They overshot the market and didn't need as many hops," she said.

Brenton Roy, president of Oasis Farms northeast of Prosser, said this year's crop was "100 percent contract," which meant any surplus hops would be left in the field. Roy estimated he left about 4 percent of his crop on the vine.

"For us it's not going to have a large impact, but I'm sure for some growers it will," he said.

Roy expects this year's overabundant crop to enlarge the hops surplus, which he said will lead to a decrease in contracts.

"(This) will oversupply the market, so acres that have expiring contracts will undoubtedly not be contracted" in the future, he said.

Puterbaugh disagreed. He attributed the overabundance to the recession causing a decrease in demand.

He said contracts likely will stay in place because once the recession passes, the demand for hops will grow again.

"It's all part of farming," he said.

Roy said he thinks Washington's hops acreage will have to decrease by about 5,000 acres for supply and demand to balance, which is why he expects to see unrenewed contracts.

"The market will control that," he said.

George also said contracts may not be renewed and some existing contracts may be bought out.

Hops harvest ended for many farmers in late September, but George said some will be pushing into the second week of October before calling it quits.

submitted by Drew Foster: 585-7207; dfoster@tricityherald.com