Manual of American grape-growing

by U. P. Hedrick

Watering at planting is necessary only when the land is parched with drought or in regions in which irrigation is practiced. When necessary, water should be used liberally, at least a gallon or two to a vine. After the earth has been firmed about the roots and the hole is nearly filled, the water should be poured in and the hole filled without more firming. Under dry weather conditions, some prefer to puddle the roots; that is, to dip them in thin mud and plant with the mud adhering. In making the puddle, loose loam and not sticky clay is used, as clay may bake so hard as to injure the roots. With puddling, as with watering, the surface soil should be left loose and soft without traces of the puddling below.

Manure or fertilizer about the roots or even in the hole are not necessary or even desirable. If the soil is to be enriched at all at planting time, the fertilizer should be spread on the surface to be cultivated in or to have its food elements leak down as rains fall. In land in which the providential design for grapes is plainly manifested, the vine at no time responds heartily to fertilizers, the good of stable manure probably coming for the most part from its effects on the texture and water-holding capacity of the soil. The newly set plant is not in need of outside nourishment; to put rank manure or strong commercial fertilizers about the roots of a young newly set vine is plant infanticide.

Care of Young Vines

Virgil calls the period in the life of the vine between the setting and the first vintage, the "tender nonage," and tells us that at this time the vines need careful rearing; so they do, now as then, American grapes as well as the grapes of ancient Rome. Fortunately, any departure from normal well-being is easily told in the grape, for the color of the leaf is as accurate an index to the health and vigor of the vine as the color of the tongue or the beat of the pulse in man. A change of color from the luxuriant green of thrifty grape foliage, especially the yellow hue indicating that the leaf-green is not functioning properly, suggests that the vines are sick or need nursing in some detail of care. When all goes well, however, the amazing energy of Nature is nowhere better seen among plants than in the growth of the grape, so that much of the care is in the use of the knife; in fact, as we shall see, the grape almost lives by the knife the first two years out.

The first year.

The vines having been pruned and staked at planting, these operations need no attention in the first summer. Many varieties send up several shoots as growth starts, and, except in the case of grafted plants and in the event of the suckers coming from the stock, these should be left to feed the vine and help to establish a good root system. Vines making a strong growth should be tied to the stake, at least the strongest shoot, to keep the wind from whipping it about and to keep the plants out of the way of the cultivator. The only knack in tying is to keep the vine on the windward side of the stake, thus saving the breaking of tying material.

The first year's pruning, though severe, is easily done. All but the strongest cane are cut out and this is pruned back to two buds, nearly to the ground, so that the vines are much as when set in the vineyard. This pruning, and that of the next two years, has as the object the establishment of a good root system and the production of a sturdy trunk at the height at which the vine is to be headed. It is important that the cane from which the trunk is to come be healthy and the wood well ripened. Pruning may be done at any time after the leaves fall, though most growers give preference to late winter. In cold climates it is a good practice to plow up to the young vines for winter protection, in which case the pruning should be done before plowing.

Every detail of vineyard management should be performed with care and at the accepted time in this critical first year. Cultivation must be intensive, insects and fungi must be warded off, mechanical injuries avoided, vines that have refused to grow must be marked for discard, and the vineyard be put down to a cover-crop in early August if it was not earlier planted to some hoed catch-crop.

The second year.

Work begins in the spring of the second year with the setting of trellis posts on which one wire is put up. The vine is not yet ready to train but the slender lath of the first season is not sufficient support, and the one wire on the future trellis saves the expense of staking. Tying requires some care and is usually done with string or bast. As the summer proceeds, suckers from the roots are removed and some growers thin the shoots on the young vine; some think it necessary also to top the growth if it becomes too luxuriant and so keep the cane within bounds. Suckers must be cut or broken off at the points where they originate, otherwise several new ones may start from the base of the old. If the vines are topped, it must be kept in mind that summer pruning is weakening, and the tips of shoots should, therefore, be taken when small, the object being to direct the growth into those parts of the vine which are to become permanent.