Growing Wine Grapes Common Questions
Q. How to protect grapes from fungus and disease?
A. While most grapes grown in the Northern United States are of a self pollinating variety, grapes in the Southern US such as some of the Muscadine grapes require planting a pollinizer (a plant that provides pollen.) Though some grapes are immune to disease, most are subject to fungus and other fungai related diseases. Growing grapes in a highly sunny area where there is an abundance of air circulation is recommended. Another option is spraying your grapevines. The most standard spray to use is the Bordeaux spray which consists of a mixture of copper sulfate and lime and can be applied either dry or dissolved in water. Be extremely careful when spraying grapevines because copper sulfate is an acid salt much like sulfuric acid (the acid found in car betteries.) If you happen to get any on your skin, it can cause severe burns. It is of extreme importance that you not get any in your eyes, mouth, lungs, open cuts, and especially into children or pets. Spraying grapes will also help with grape mildew, the white powder found on the leaves or grapes themselves.
Q. How to protect grapes against birds and wasps?
A. Birds are always scavenging for food and the site of a juicy grape seems to draw their attention almost every time. In order to protect grapes against birds, you must consider a few options. There's always the option of throwing a huge net over your grape farm but birds are clever creatures and will eventually find their way inside the netting even if they get caught within the net itself. Your other option of protecting grapes from birds is to hold on to those netted bags that come packed with either potatoes or onions from the grocery store. Wrap the bag over a cluster of grapes using a twist tie which should hold the grapes securely. While some birds may still get through the netted bags and pick at some grapes, most of them will end up falling at the bottom the bag. Your best bet is to use a combination of both options. Use the netted potato or onion bags wrapped over the grape clusters, and cover the grapevines with a large net just to keep them double protected.
As far as how to protect grapes from wasps, well this one is going to be fun.
If you want to test your shooting skills with a sprayer, then load up on some good ole wasp killing ammo. Dishwashing liquid works like a charm. Just fill up your sprayer with some dishwashing fluid and mix it with water. If you can manage to spray enough of this venom on the wasps, they will die within a few minutes.
There is another option of protecting grapes from wasps ofcourse, but you will have to set up your own home made yellow jacket trap. An easy way to make a homemade yellow jacket trap consists of preparing a container of the good ole wasp venom that we discussed above (dishwashing liquid and water) and hanging a piece of liver or raw fish (slightly diced on the exterior) by a string 1 to 2 inches abover the container. The dishwashing fluid will act as a wetting agent, thus eliminating surface tension and improving the trap's efficiency. Since yellow jacket wasps are attracted to raw meat, they will take the bait and overload themselves with food, eventually falling into the water and drowning.
Q. Is grapevine pruning important when growing wine grapes?
A. Yes. Pruning grapevines are necessary inorder to divert the energy from the roots into the fruit. Not pruning grapevines will cause the root energy to form lots of buds which turn into leaves, leaving the flower bunches weak and prone to fall off due to a lack of nurishment. However, when grapevine pruning is done, the energy is sent into the flower bunches making them stronger and thus not falling off.
When pruning grapevines, you will want to leave only two buds the year when your grapes are planted. On the second year, you will want to find the strongest cane and prune off all the growth except for that one strong cane. Leave about three to five buds only. Then you will want to tie the strong cane to the first wire of the trellis (a trellis is used to support your grapevines. It's usually constructed out of PVC pipe that you can get at your local hardware shop for cheap and some copper wire strung thru small holes that you can easily drill on the PVC pipe.) On the third year, leave only two fruiting canes of about six to eight buds a piece. On the fourth year, leave two longer fruiting canes, this time of about eight to twelve buds on each. Finally, on the fifth year, leave three fruiting canes of ten to twelve buds on each. Just follow this pattern every year and you will get the most out of your grapevine pruning.
When selecting the fruiting canes, you want to use the ones from the previous season's growth. Leave only one spur per fruiting cane (spur being a cane cut back into two buds) because the canes growing from the spur is used for the following year's fruiting cane. This procedure also helps keep the fruiting canes near the trunk of the vine.