NORTON.
(Aestivalis, Labrusca.)
1. Prince, 1830:186. 2. U. S. Pat. Off. Rpt., 1845:939. 3. Horticulturist, 12:461. 1857. 4. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt., 1858:68. 5. Ib., 1860:88. 6. Horticulturist, 16:16, 286. 1861. 7. U. S. Pat. Off. Rpt., 1865:197. 8. Horticulturist, 20:39. 1865. 9. Husmann, 1866:19, 48, 85, 87, fig., 98. 10. Horticulturist, 22:355. 1867. 11. Am. Pom. Soc. Cat., 1867:44. 12. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt., 1867:111. 13. Grape Cult., 1:5, 74, 98, 122, 138, 150, 212, 296. 1869. 14. Bush. Cat., 1883:126. 15. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt., 1885:100. 16. Ib., 1889:109. 17. Mo. Hort. Soc. Rpt., 1891:131. 18. Am. Gard., 20:688. 1899. 19. Mo. Sta. Bul., 46:40, 43, 45, 51, 54. 1899. 20. N. Y. Sta. An. Rpt., 18:397. 1899. 21. Mo. Hort. Soc. Rpt., 1905:59.
Norton’s Seedling (9). Norton’s Virginia (3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 15, 21). Norton’s Virginia (14, 18). Norton’s Virginia Seedling (1, 2, 4). Virginia Seedling (9, 13).
Norton is the leading wine grape in eastern America, and, if we except Cynthiana, which can hardly be told from it, the wine made from it is the best of its class made in the regions in which the variety will grow. The fruit is of small value for any other purpose than wine. Norton is fairly hardy but requires a long warm season to reach maturity. While it is said that it may be grown wherever Catawba thrives, this has not proved to be the case in New York; Norton in this State is far more precarious than Catawba in maturity, so much so that it is now scarcely grown even in the most favored parts of New York. It has great adaptability to soils and thrives in rich alluvials or clays, gravels or sands, the only requisite seemingly being a fair amount of fertility and soil warmth. The vines are robust, very productive, especially on fertile soils, as free, or more so, from fungal diseases than any others of our native grapes, and very resistant to phylloxera.
The bunches of Norton are of medium size, not averaging nearly as large as the one shown in the illustration, and the berries are small; the fruit is not at all attractive in appearance. The grapes are pleasant eating when fully ripe, rich and spicy, and pure-flavored but tart if not quite ripe; but still are in no sense table grapes. The fruit keeps well. The cluster usually ripens evenly and the berries neither shatter nor crack. The variety is difficult to propagate from cuttings and to transplant, and the vines do not bear grafts readily.
Norton has been used to quite an extent in breeding work and the blood may be found in a number of desirable grapes but it is not a prolific parent of worthy grapes as has been the case with so many of its contemporary varieties. Like Concord, Norton gives, in experimental work, many white seedlings.