Loose Reed Brewing Company

Getting closer on the barley...malting experiments on extra seed is proceeding.

Great news today! We officially submitted our building permit application to the City of Greenville!

Also, we'll offer a free tasting at Crafted, The Beer Store Friday, February 26th. Official time and, of course, beers TBD. We're excited to bring our beers to Simpsonville!

It’s been a long time since I posted about the barley. With the extremely warm weather, growth is way ahead of schedule. Unfortunately, that isn’t necessarily a good thing. Too much vegetative growth during a warm fall can make winter cereals prone to freeze damage when it finally gets cold. Also, winter cereal grains require vernalization (prolonged exposure to cold weather) in order for them to flower and produce grain. That hasn’t happened yet! Thankfully, it appears that some actual winter weather is coming later this week. I’m going to hope for the best.

On to the pictures, the first one shows the start of tillering. The picture is from November 23rd, almost four weeks after planting (10/28). In the picture, you can see the 1st tiller on the right side of the centered plant. Tillers are the horizontal shoots off the main stem. Tiller density correlates directly with yield. The idea is that good vegetative growth better prepares the plant to produce grain during flowering.

In the next picture, there is a plant in about the same growth stage. Unfortunately though, some aphids invaded the exterior of the plot. Those splotches on the right side of the shoot are the aphids. Aphids are bad news for a couple reasons. One, they literally suck the sap right out of the plant, which deprives the barley of nutrients. Two, aphids are the vector for yellow barley dwarf virus, the most common disease in cereal grains. Since I identified the aphids, I’ve monitored the plot for signs of disease or additional infestation. I haven’t noticed either. Some colder weather should help too.

The next two pictures just illustrate some further development. The first of the two is from December 3rd. It shows additional leaf and tiller growth. And the other one is from last Tuesday. It shows the entire plot. The tiller growth is now too thick to actually pick out individual plants. The next step is for the plants to “green up,” which means they start to grow vertically rather than horizontally. It is a precursor growth stage before flowering. The vertical starts once the weather warms up, typically in February around here. We need the weather to actually get cold first!

Don't want this to get lost because I think it's hilarious. It turns out that Marv from Headforbeer has a picture of Claire taking one of the pictures we previously posted from the Greenville Craft Beer Festival. Cheers everyone!