Fruit ripens just before Catawba, an excellent keeper. Clusters variable in size, of average length and breadth, tapering to cylindrical, frequently single-shouldered, usually compact; peduncle above medium length and thickness; pedicel short, slender, smooth with very slight swelling at point of attachment to berry; brush short, slender, wine-colored. Berries inferior in size, roundish to slightly oblate, dark purplish-black to black, glossy, covered with a fair amount of blue bloom, persistent, firm. Skin rather thin, tough, nearly free from pulp, contains little or no pigment, not astringent. Flesh yellowish-green, not juicy, somewhat tender when fully ripe, has some Post-oak flavor, vinous, spicy, sweetish at skin to tart next the seeds, good to very good. Seeds separate easily from pulp, one to four, average two or three, small, of mean length and breadth, blunt, brownish; raphe sometimes cord-like; chalaza intermediate in size, slightly above center, oval to pear-shaped, distinct.
CATAWBA.
(Labrusca, Vinifera.)
1. Adlum, 1823:109, 139. 2. Ib., 1828:173. 3. Ib., 1828:176. 4. Prince, 1830:175. 5. Ib., 1830:180. 6. U. S. Pat. Off. Rpt., 1845:312, 938, 939. 7. Ib., 1847:462, 463, 464, 465, 466, 467, 469. 8. Mag. Hort., 15:513. 1849. 9. West. Hort. Rev., 1:15. 1850. 10. U. S. Pat. Off. Rpt., 1851:48, 49, 51. 11. Am. Pom. Soc. Cat., 1852:54. 12. Buchanan, 1852:23, 71, 96, 106. 13. Elliott, 1854:244. 14. Hooper, 1857:274. 15. Horticulturist, 16:120. 1861. 16. Mag. Hort., 28:506. 1862. 17. Ib., 29:73. 1863. 13. Gar. Mon., 5:73, 74, 184. 1863. 19. N. Y. Ag. Soc. Rpt., 1864:42. 20. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt., 1867:43. 21. Fuller, 1867:220, 241, 248. 22. Gar. Mon., 9:214. 1867. 23. Horticulturist, 23:298. 1868. fig. of leaf. 24. Downing, 1869:533. 25. Barry, 1872:421. 26. Gar. Mon., 14:167. 1872. 27. Ohio Hort. Soc. Rpt., 1875-6:72, 73. 28. Bush. Cat., 1883:80. fig. 29. Am. Pom. Soc. Rpt., 1883:118. 30. Am. Gard., 12:581. 1891. 31. Gar. and For., 8:487. 1895. 32. N. Y. Sta. An. Rpt., 15:432. 1896. 33. Ib., 17:527, 540, 543, 544, 548, 552. 1898. 34. Ev. Nat. Fruits, 1898:53. 35. N. Y. Sta. An. Rpt., 18:367, 374, 386, 396. 1899. 36. Mo. Sta. Bul., 46:38, 43, 44, 45. 1899. 37. Kan. Sta. Bul., 110:235. 1902. 38. Rural N. Y., 61:722. 1902. 39. Traité gen. de vit., 6:282. 1903.
Arkansas (13). Catawba Tokay (4, 13, 18, 24, 39). Cherokee (15). Fancher (?24, 39). Keller’s White (39). Lebanon Seedling (13, 18). Lincoln (9). Mammoth Catawba (39). Mead’s Seedling (39). Merceron (39). Michigan (16, 17). Michigan (24, 39). Muncy (3). Muncy Pale Red (5). Muncy, pale red? (4). Omega (39). Red Muncy (4?, 13, 18, 24, 28, 39). Rose of Tennessee (18). Saratoga (?24, 39). Singleton (13, 18, 28,?39). Tekomah (39). Tokay (1). Tokay (4, 28, 39). Virginia Amber (18). White Catawba (39).
From many points of view the Catawba is the most interesting of our American grapes. The elasticity of constitution which enables it to adapt itself to many environments and therefore to succeed in a vast region; its possible existence for centuries in the wild state, for the records of a century have not divulged the secret of its origin, of its ancestry, or of its introduction; its high quality and attractive appearance which give it intrinsic value as a table grape and for making wine; the fact that it was our first great American grape and that after a century it is still one of the four leading varieties of grapes cultivated in eastern America and that after this lapse of time it is the chief of all northern varieties for wine-making; all these make Catawba of prime interest to the grower of American grapes. The Catawba, too, has had the rare distinction of having a poet, Longfellow, sing its praises:
“Very good in its way is the Verzenay
Or the Sillery, soft and creamy,
But Catawba wine has a taste more divine,
More dulcet, delicious and dreamy.
There grows no vine, by the haunted Rhine,
By the Danube or Guadalquiver,
Nor island or cape, that bears such a grape
As grows by the beautiful River.”
