Re: No grapes, vine pruning advice

Thanks Moira,

for your, as always, sensible advice. I have decided to spur prune some of
the well placed laterals and cut off others, then severely head back the
main canes. In spring, I'll prune again (probably what you call summer
thinning)!

I have also been advised by a California wine grower to vigorously water
spray the tiny bunches when the grapes go into bloom in order to interfere
with self pollination. And while I knew this to be a treatment to inhibit
fruiting on olive trees, I never thought of it for my grape!  Duhh! :-)

I include this to the MeditPlant List, as I think someone might be
interested.

Regards,  Jan
Upland, California

jansmithen@earthlink.net
Sunset zone : 19
USDA zone   : 10


On 12/9/03 1:17 PM, tomory@xtra.co.nz wrote

> Jan Smithen wrote:
>> After having seen many beautiful arbors covered in grape vines all
>> around the Mediterranean, I planted a 'Golden Muscat' to train up and
>> over for leafy summer cover.  This American hybrid is resistant to
>> mildew and, after 3 years a lovely vine.  I spur pruned it last
>> winter before my accident.
> 
> HI Jan
> Somhow I seem to have missed hearing of your accident, but am glad to
> hear you are apparently finally getting over it and hope the effects
> soon cease to trouble you any more..
> 
> But this last season it produced (over produced) hundreds and hundreds of
>> bunches of grapes.  While I could, I tried thinning out the immature
>> fruit clusters, but it just produced more! it was clearly a losing
>> battle! When ripening began, the local fruit rats moved in!  Their
>> nightly revelries included much romping and scuttling, all the while
>> depositing the seeds and skins on the patio and furniture below -
>> very picky eaters! All this while, I'm in a wheelchair & walker,
>> fretting by the window :)
>> 
>> Now that I'm (almost) hale and able again, I need pruning advice for
>> this winter so I don't host next season's bacchanalia!  Should I cut
>> off all the lateral growth, leaving only the main framework? I really
>> don't care if I get any fruit at all, as long as I discourage the rat
>> parties!
> 
> You certainly have set yourself a problem with this grape. I am afraid
> once a grape starts producing it seems in my experience that little will
> stop it apart from several years of total neglect allowing it to grow
> into an unmangeable tangle that pulls down its  support.
> 
> In normal(spur) pruning one does anyway cut all lateral growth back
> heavily each year, but retaining the basal one or two buds to ensure
> regrowth. By cutting a lateral back flush with the stem on the other
> hand (as in summer thining) it can be usually got rid of altogether.
> What it amounts to I think is one can either have a main rod with
> laterals which willy nilly will mostly  bear fruit or one with few or no
> laterals at all and just growth from the end (which will not exactly
> achieve the leafy cover you desire.).
> 
> You might suppose that a few years of no manuring could slow down the
> exuberance of cropping, but I have a  grapevine myself which has had no
> special fertilizing of any kind since planting and now something like
> twenty years later still grows (and fruits) with undiminished enthusiasm.
> 
> A diifferent approach you could adopt if you really don't want the
> fruits is to remove this vine altogether and replace it with a
> specifically ornamental species. There are two Asiatic grapevines which
> rarely if ever fruit and even if they should do so produce very little.
> They are  Vitis amurensis the Amurland grape which turns all sorts of
> bright colours in fall and  V coignetiae (Crimson Glory vine ) which has
> bronzy young foliage and turns red or purple in autumn.
> 
> There is also V vinifera purpurea (Teinturier Grape) which has dark
> purple leaves and small bitter fruits (which your fussy rats might not
> like).
> Any of these still need spur pruning each winter if they are not to get
> unmanageable, but it can be done quite roughly with loppers so my
> climber book says.
> 
> Moira
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