Grapes- Wild and Otherwise

[MontyJ]

Yes, I'm aware that the reason for growing fruits and vegetables is to obtain produce. That's why I don't use my grapevines as a shade structure.
Production using this method is very heavy. This is the only vine I used to make jelly this past fall and it produced 72 8oz jars or 4.5 gallons. If I remember correctly, it takes about 24 pounds of grapes to make 7 quarts of juice so that vine produced about 60+ pounds of grapes.

I don't use the Canadice for jelly. It's more of a spicy grape. In fact, that vine and the Niagra are both being removed this spring. Don't worry, they are going to a good home I'm replacing them with one more concord and a Thompson. I planted the Niagra because the DW loves white grapes. Well, turns out she doen't like slip-skin. She wants the "ones like you buy in the store".

2010 was the first year that I had black rot that bad. I now start the spray program as soon as the buds begin to swell. It's a live and learn kind of thing, like gardening always is. That vine did recover, but it didn't produce any fruit that year. I use that vine for fresh eating grapes and give a lot of them to family and friends.

 

[Durgan]

Grapes vary widely in their vigor but usually produce between 15 and 20 pounds of grapes in 3 to 4 years when pruned and spaced a few feet apart from each other. An old vine allowed to grow much larger will produce more.

Ten pounds is considered typical for a home grape arbour. My thirty to fifty pound actually weighed and not estimated is exceptional. This is one plant with four legs at 30 inches and 60 inches, and a total of four feet long allowed for spreading, pruned heavily each year. This means the total leg length is 16 feet.

As an aside the same applies to potatoes. I have seen postings of ten pounds per plant. This is not possible in my experience. Four pounds per plant is good and it may vary from about 2.5 to 8 pounds per plant very much weather and soil dependent.

 

[MontyJ]

I'm not exactly sure how to take that Durgan.

My vines are grown in a double T with a 12 foot spread, giving them 24 feet of "legs" as you call them. The arbors rows are spaced 6 feet apart to allow for good airflow, and so I can fit the tractor between them.

 

[897tgigvib]

Different gardeners can have different methods and even purposes.
Different writers can have different styles and even purposes.

Sometimes a writer and gardener can be very different than another writer and gardener.

 

[Durgan]

Different gardeners can have different methods and even purposes.
Different writers can have different styles and even purposes.

Sometimes a writer and gardener can be very different than another writer and gardener.

Opinion and fact! Guestimate and hard figures! Nothing like getting the bathroom scales out and doing a bit of weighing.

Many garden books are plagiarizing of some old book written years ago, and the recommendations must be tested or at least reflected upon.

 

[GardenGeisha]

I have researched grapes that do well in cold country, down to 30 below, if anyone is interested in my info.

If you wouldn't mind voting for my recipe with garden vegetables in it below, I sure would appreciate it, as I need your help! I'm trying to win a trip for a friend who is in need of cheering up. All you need to register to vote for the recipe is your name, e-mail address and password. Date of Birth and phone number, etc., are not required, even though they are on the form:

http://biggestoliveoilcookbookcontest.com/recipe/249

 

[vfem]

My grape with a double T in its 6th year (being moved to a new location in its 5th) I pruned heavily, and it produced a weight of 15 lbs at harvest. Last year, just over 17. We only allow it 8' feet spread.

I can't wait to see how my new grape vine from cutting will do in its 3rd year.

Also a cutting from a muscadine grape just got transplanted at 1 year old, and we're going to try that one on a fence.

Didn't places, I want to see how they do!?

 

[Durgan]

Another feature about grape production. Total weight is important but quality is also of much interest. By quality I refer to size and juice amount of the fruit. Concord is my favourite and I like the fruit to be relatively large.

http://www.durgan.org/URL/?AZQUW 16 September 2011 Concord Grapes

This production I considerer a little above average and more than acceptable.

 

[Durgan]

Another feature about grape production. Total weight is important but quality is also of much interest. By quality I refer to size and juice amount of the fruit. Concord is my favourite and I like the fruit to be relatively large.

http://www.durgan.org/URL/?AZQUW 16 September 2011 Concord Grapes

This production I considerer a little above average and more than acceptable.

 

[897tgigvib]

With Grape production the most important criterion varies wildly depending on who is growing them and for what purpose. I was raised in wine country, learned to drive on a tractor in a vineyard.

For some of my friends nothing is more important than quality. The proper flavor along with the highest possible brix sugar levels. The Yandells will even ensure the harvest once processed takes the character that the Grapes will lean toward in the barrel. That is a concept that consistently wins the very highest awards. The small acreage is personally cared for by a family who sits at dinner talking about what to do the next day for the vines. Their wine would cost 200 to 600 dollars a bottle if it was ever sold. They sometimes give me a bottle. I think it's the stuff a friend of mine 2,000 years ago made from water at a wedding! That good!

The Martinellis strive toward quality with high brix as an average per acre, and as most wineries do, allow some "peppering" of other varieties to increase the brix. The methods do produce a consistently good wine, and production per acre is important.

A friend works at Sutter in Saint Helena (sain ehleenuh). They have several product lines, but their main line is inexpensive wines that do carry the proper character and consistently, but that main line would never make even the first cut in a wine presentation, being mainly for salloons and bars and restaurants. For them, almost nothing is as important as production. Clarity and proper color are properly ensured during the very clean winemaking processes. Brix level is brought up as needed by mixing in better grapes of a similar color up to a certain percentage. For Sutter's main lineage, brix is important to the contracted growers for the price they will get per ton they bring in, but they can pepper their crop almost as much as they want within reason to get that brix. For these growers, the more tons per acre the better.