Grape vines go crazy

More buds, more foliage this year.

  

After all the 100-degree days last summer, I expected our St. Vincent vines to show stress this year. Instead, nearly all plants are producing more buds than ever, and the foliage that shot out in the late-winter warmth is making the vines shaggier this year in mid-April than they were last year in mid-May.

Even one of the two sad vines on the east end of the row has come up with a couple of buds. If a good portion of the buds turn into grape clusters, I'd say we'll have a harvest of twice the quantity this year.

Last year, I followed the advice of a pal who recommended thinning the number of clusters to about 10 per vine to avoid stress that would reduce the yield in the next year. I thinned all but one plant. This year, that undisturbed vine has more buds than than the others that were thinned, so I'm doubting the value of the practice.

This year, I may go for maximum yield, come what may.

This year's foliage in mid-April is bushier than last year's in mid-May.

Pruning in the urban vineyard

Last weekend, my friend Jane Toben helped me prune the vines in the back yard. I have eight St. Vincent plants. Some are vigorous, others are puny. The strong vines had become a tangled mess after a productive season:

Before pruning.

 But we cut them down into an organized structure that will enable growth and yield:

Same spot on the vine after pruning.

I had stared at the vines for a few minutes for several days in a row last week, wondering what I should do with them. I have notes from the previous two or three years of pruning with Jane, but they never make any sense when I review them. I also have a training video of the two of us pruning. The video does make sense, but only for the decisions we were making at the time. The learning curve is so long because it's something I do for 30 minutes once a year.

In any case, Jane came over and said the same things she has said in past years, as preserved in my notes and the training video, and they made perfect sense.

Among the highlights, we cut out two main cordons that looked sad and, in each case, wrapped a more vigorous cane around the wire to become a new and productive cordon:

New cordon (left).

The flexibility of the vines and the strategy of pruning fascinated me.

Jane's pruning pointers:

• Don't start cutting until you have analyzed the whole vine.
• First take off everything you don't want.
• Space canes about a foot apart.
• Favor canes going up over canes going down.
• On each cane you leave on the vine, count 6-8 buds out and cut.
• Keep the growth close to the trunk.
• Better take off too much than not enough.

Ed with Jane Toben.

The urban vineyard in winter

The mild winter makes me want to skip forward to pruning time in the urban vineyard. That time is really not all that far away, maybe a month, and slight bumps suggesting buds are already scattered along the sticks of the vines.

The first vintage (2010) from these St. Vincent could use a 1 percent shot of sugar and should be ready to drink. The 2011 is also coming along.

Last year, I acquired Norton and Chambourcin grapes from Michael and Sandy Dennis of Tyler Ridge Vineyard and Winery in northern Greene County. The Norton already has that rich fruit and spice character.

Norton is that variety that growers, seeking a truly American wine grape, have been developing for nearly 200 years. It's story is documented in the absorbing book, The Wild Vine, by Todd Kliman.

Fighting Japanese beetles

In mid-June, Japanese beetles arrived and began munching the leaves of our eight St. Vincent plants in the back yard. By the end of the month, the damage started to exceed our ability to contain the pests by killing them one by one between our thumbs and forefingers. So, we put up the shroud again (above). I think we encased a few bugs within the shroud, because the damage seemed to have worsened slightly when I inspected it this week. But, overall, the damage is minimal, and the presence of the beetles in the neighborhood seems less menacing this year.

I'd  like to hear from anyone who has a Japanese beetle report. Worse? Not so bad? About the same?

See my report on last year's shroud escapade.