This little garden cart with my fabricated umbrella holder has been an absolute game changer! Especially during this heatwave in the North East US.
$70 total and makes suckering and thinning much more enjoyable!
I had this extra vine that began to bud that I threw in a large pot with a bit of dirt. The buds looked fine and I transplanted it after a deep freeze that swept across the area. I have a data logger about 2 feet from the pot that read the coldest temperature as being 38F. Fast forward a week later and it looks to have frost damage to me. Can anyone confirm this? If so, I believe it happened for an interesting reason.
Radiative sky cooling happens when an object is able to radiate out heat energy to the sky/space like a heatsink. You’ll see evidence of this as frost on your roof shingles despite the temperature being above freezing. If this is frost damage, I think it could have happened by the soil radiating heat to the sky, dropping the soil temperature below freezing, which sub-sequentially drops the temperature of the air trapped in the oversized pot below freezing. If the pot had been filled to the top with dirt I think this may not have happened.
Here is what I used last year in the vineyard. Planning to use similar this year.
In planned order of use through the season...
I tend to lean toward OMRI or natural products after veraison.
I also have Fullback but I'm reading it's got great curative properties so may leave it out of the program unless I have a mildew outbreak. Also reading Gatten has good curative properties?
For an outbreak I usually spray PB & Oil and follow up very shortly after with something like Fullback.
Any insight, experience, especially with the prevenatitve/curative properties of any of the above, most welcome.
I'm also toying with the idea of running 100% sulfur on a vinifera block to see how that fares. We have high disease pressure in our area so I would have to spray Kumulus every 7 days, likely.
Looking for 25 Siegerebbe vines for planting October. Can anyone point me in the right direction please?
Hi, I took over a vineyard of 600 plants here in Scandinavia last spring. I've read a lot about pruning but still feel like I need some answers, so here we go.
The vineyard is about 20 years old and pruned as double cordon. I want to turn it into a double guyot as I feel like it would save me a ton of work. Is it possible?
My plan would be to let a branch grow from the trunk this year below one of the cordons. Cut the cordon of in the winter and bind the branch where the cordon used to be, and cut it to length. Next year repeat with the second cordon.
Secondly; in march I cut above second bud, and I can see the base, 1st and 2nd bud is shooting. I reckon it's the 2nd bud that will produce my grape, so would it be a good idea to remove the others now?
I also cant wrap my head around which buds are gonna produce grapes next year, I really need a dummies guide with pictures, lots of pictures!
I might be overthinking this, but any input would mean a lot, thanks!
Hi All,
Hoping to borrow some knowledge. I'm very much an amateur at this.
In the last few days one chard vine has started to really badly wilt.
Its neighbours are fine, but just this one vine seems to be really struggling.
The vine is 3 years old.
We have been quite dry here in the UK, we did have some hail this week which caused leaf damage across all the vines and a good amount of rain.
But I don't see why just this one would be struggling when its neighbours are doing so well.
I have reposted with a pic from today which shows much more wilting.
haven't seen them this early in missoula before, this feels about a month before they'd normally be out. anyone else experiencing an early bloom in the colder zones, should i expect an expedited schedule this year or keep along with dates?
wanted to also ask if I should start taking cold night protection measures or if they look like they're doing alright. nights are still at low 30s but we've been getting high uv during the day. thanks! looking forward to talking with ya'll!
Call me crazy, but I am gonna attempt to grow a vine on my balcony. I live in Southern California (Costa Mesa), and my balcony gets a good bit of sunshine every day in the afternoon and into the evening. It's not ideal conditions, but I'm gonna attempt and just see what happens. Aiming to get a 25-30 gallon pot so the roots can do their thing as much as possible. Don't plan on making a bunch, I'd be happy to end up with a bottle or two from each harvest.
Would love any advice or thoughts. I've made alcohol many times, grown many house plants, but never grown grapes.
Hi everyone,
I’m growing two bare-root grapevines in Zone 8a, North Carolina and looking for some early training advice.
I planted:
Suffolk grapevine on April 9, 2026
Himrod grapevine on April 16, 2026
Both were started as bare-root vines, and they’ve recently begun pushing out new growth. Right now, each vine is producing several young shoots from the original cane.
I’ve already thinned out a couple of weaker shoots and am now left with a few stronger contenders on each plant.
Current situation:
Some shoots have thicker bases but fewer leaves
Others have thinner stems but slightly larger or more developed-looking leaves
All growth is still very young
My question:
At this stage, should I select a single strongest shoot right away to become the main trunk, or is it okay to temporarily let 2–3 shoots grow a bit longer before narrowing it down to one?
Also, if anyone has experience growing Suffolk or Himrod grapes in warmer climates (Zone 8a), I’d really appreciate any early training/pruning advice so I don’t set the vines up poorly long-term.
Thanks in advance!
I planted this thing, which i believe is a thompson seedless, probably 15 years ago on a whim and have not cared for it at all, despite this it has grown fantastically. A few years ago i noticed these spots on the leaves (could have been going on longer and I just never noticed). The grapes always turned out fairly small and a large number of them would seemingly just turn into raisins before they were done growing. My best guess was some sort of powdery mildew so this winter I tried to actually start caring for it and pruned it back for the first time. For the first few months of this growing season it looked like the spots were gone however they seem to have developed again. Anyone know what it could be and or how to fix it?
it is planted on (and has essentially consumed) a trellis on a south facing wall in southern California so it gets about as much sun as it could possibly want.
as for watering, I think I sprayed it with the garden hose once a decade or so ago, and there is a sprinkler probably 10 feet away that sprays within a few feet of the base of the vine for probably 10 min a day.
the soil is just the dirt in the ground, i'm no expert but based on what i've read it seems like I have a pretty good type of soil for grapes here. As a testament to that the vine has seemingly self propagated twice.
I’ve got some Blanc du Bois root stock planted here in Central Texas on the escarpment, but it ain’t doing well. Can anyone diagnose this? It’s curious because I have Tempranillo nearby and it’s doing fine. Appreciate any tips, new grower here.
Hey everyone, I find myself in an odd conundrum.
Last year I decided to try growing vines on my deck in containers. I sourced planters, ordered vines and then, because life goes like this sometimes, I couldn't get a component of the container medium in time. In fact I didn't end up getting it until late autumn. So I planted my vines in temporary 1-gallon starter pots and hoped life would smile on me soon. In the meantime I got anxious and made a couple mistakes, like pruning down to one bud instead of letting it do its thing. All summer these vines stayed in the 1-gal pots. Autumn came and I was able to get all of the soil mix components but didn't have time before frost to mix them up and get the vines in the full size planters.
When everything thawed I mixed the soil and transplanted the vines but it looked like they died, so I ordered new ones. Well, right when I get the new vines ready to go I see the old ones are actually budding, their budburst was just later than the other vines nearby I used for reference. Now I have these two new ones, don't have space for four vines, and my question is: should swap out the old and put in the new (since they haven't been subjected to a subpar growing season, and might be able to establish "optimally") or stick with the old ones because they're "established"?
According to the instructions that came with the vines, now that I've unpacked them and soaked them in water they should probably get planted this weekend, so I'm feeling some urgency to make this decision.
Thank you all, very much!
14 Zinfandel vines in front yard, 15 Zinfandel vines in back yard. 3 years old. It does not make a lot of wine but it is a lot of fun, and my, oh my how the neighbors talk.
I have not irrigated this year, and I might not need to. We have heavy clay soil in San Jose, CA. These vines grow like crazy and even hedging them just results in more lateral growth. Zinfandel 3.1 on SO4 rootstock, the SO4 may explain the excess vigor. I finally have the spur positions set on the front vines. The poor vines in the back have been moved a couple of times now due to poor planning. Zinfandel is finicky. Some vines have initial buds push, then the shoots wither and secondary buds push and form the canes. It may just happen on young vines, the older vines seem to not show the problem.
I have a nice hillside next to a river here in Wyoming that I’m thinking about putting a long row (1/4mi) of grape vines on. Soil is sandy loam with a little bit of clay, northeast aspect of a shallow slope. Had the county extension agent out who thought the location might be good to experiment on. He dropped a book off on growing wine grapes in Wyoming and I was pleased to see Marquette, Frontenac, and Itasca, all of which I’ve had and think make lovely wines.
Curious if anyone else here has first-hand experience growing grapes up in this country (or even Montana since it’s only 20 miles north of me)
Thanks in advance… I’ll be sure to keep you updated on my journey if I decide to plant some next spring.
Hi everyone! I’m new to the grapevine world. I planted some vines a few weeks ago and noticed a few are recovering from the initial stress after planting. However, I noticed a few with very dark leaves. I would love to hear your thoughts on what could be the potential issue. These are planted in Southern California.
I’m seeing the odd leaf just wither away and fall off the plant. Some being half withered like the one in the upper right corner. Recently there was a hail storm and some leaves have been damaged and shredded a bit but this seems like a different sort of symptom. Just curious as to if anyone has any insight in to it?
14 days in December saw high temperatures above 70 with five of them above 80 F. January had an 8-day streak of highs above 80. Some of my 180 Syrah vines woke up quite early. Saw some isolated bud break on Jan 4 with some shoot growth on Jan 8. Vines are in various stages of growth at this point. Today we have about 20 clusters already in veraison. Measured a few berries at 12-15 Brix. I think I’d better drop the mature ones. Maybe I’ll try to make some verjus.
I bought these young grape vines but a bit unsure on how to prune them to properly form a strong trunk, they are about 1 - 2 years old