Pruning the 5-year-old vines

Alex pruning and taping to the overhead trellises

This should be the year that we finally get some grapes. The first 10 vines (4 Solaris and 6 Rondo) will have reached five years of age this spring.  Three of the four Solaris vine are very robust. Three of the five Rondo vines are very robust. The others are alive but not growing as vigorously.

Today we pruned. It was difficult at first to force ourselves to remove some of the really strong growth, but we knew we had to do radical surgery to increase productivity. And we did. It looks pretty good and ten vines did not take us very long - about an hour working together.

We chose the spur pruning method so we left two cordons from each trunk and cut the spurs on them to 4 buds. Some say to leave only 2 buds, but for our first vines in their first productive year (we hope), we left 4 each. We will learn with each year.

We soon had several piles of canes and decided to create a habitat for wildlife by bunching them between the row of chestnut trees and the hedgerow behind them. We have a pine marten living nearby, and we'd like to encourage other animals to return to the land here. We've heard that red squirrels are coming closer, so when they get here, we'll have a home for them.

Now we have to tend to the grass, decide if we want to plant a companion crop, and sit back and wait for the fruit. I'll be buying a soil testing kit next. 

Before

After

Piles of vines to be disposed of

The upper vineyard showing yesterday's work.