THE Hogs Back Brewery in Tongham is set to become the largest brewer growing hops in the UK after commencing the fourth, and final, harvest of its existing hop garden before relocating to a much larger site for 2019.

For centuries, hop picking was an annual pursuit for many in Farnham as entire families would head out into the fields surrounding the town every August and September to help bring in the year’s hop yield.

Although hop growing is no longer the linchpin of Farnham’s economy and fortune, thanks to the Hampton Estate near Puttenham and more recently the Hogs Back Brewery, the area’s great hop-picking tradition has been kept alive - and in both cases is back on the rise.

In 2017, the Hampton Estate increased its hop-growing operation by a further 10 acres with the addition of a new bespoke hop picking and drying facility. And this autumn the Hogs Back is to follow suit - relocating from its existing three-and-a-half acre hop garden adjacent to the brewery, to a much larger eight-and-a-half acre garden to the immediate east.

This will have the effect of almost tripling the Hogs Back’s hop-growing operation, meaning, whereas its current garden supplies around 15 to 20 per cent of the brewery’s hops, this number could soon rise to more than 50 per cent.

Considering the Hogs Back also buys many of its hops from the nearby Hampton Estate, from next year it is hoped as many as 80 per cent of Hogs Back’s hops could be grown within walking distance of the brewery.

Hogs Back harvested the first hops from its existing garden in September 2015, bringing the traditional but near-extinct Farnham White Bine hop variety back to its Surrey home.

And on Thursday last week, this year’s harvest began around a fortnight earlier than usual due to the long, hot summer with the picking of White Bine, Fuggles and Pioneer varieties, and picking of the brewery’s fourth and final hop, Cascade, expected to follow this week.

Once harvesting is over, the plants will be gradually relocated to the new site, a freshly ploughed former wheat field east of the brewery, with a vast traditional high-wire hop garden set to be in place this Christmas - giving commuters on the A31 a daily reminder of Farnham’s proud hop growing heritage.

? Hogs Back Brewery’s annual Hop Harvest Party takes place on Saturday, September 22. For tickets, see www.hogsback.co.uk.