Grow Your Own Magazine

We moved house last year and inherited a large grapevine growing along the old garage. Last year we didn't do anything to it and had gazillions of grapes on it but they were all teeny-tiny ones - too small to bother with eating really.

It was very very overgrown so I pruned it back quite a lot in autumn - really back to just the main stem.

I know nothing about grapevines, but I wondered whether there is anything I can do to encourage fewer but larger fruits, or could it be just a small-fruited variety? That's assuming we get anything off it this year, my other half is convinced I've killed it because of the amount I chopped off!

I think I read somewhere that you need to thin out the fruits to get better quaility/size. Either by taking off some of the bunches or trimming out some of the little grapes from each bunch

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Off to China

It's very unlikely you killed it. Even if there's just one bud left it'll soon regrow. At the age that vine is, it can easily bear a large number of bunches each year. To get bigger grapes, you'll need to thin the grapes in the bunch - there are special scissors available for the job.

It's definitely not killed, it is starting to sprout now, but my other half has a strange view of things in the garden! He wanted to rip it out when we arrived last year because he thought it was dead then too!

thin the grapes in the bunch, that sounds like a dull old job! The bunches were quite tightly packed last year - there's a photo of some here..
DSC_2289 on Flickr - Photo Sharing!

Should I be thinning to say, half the number? When should I be doing it? As early on as possible - basically when they are big enough to handle?

Thanks!

BL
Thin out the number of bunches on the vine, in your picture I would have removed the two lefthand bunches, bunches with a small number of grapes remove and leave the bigger ones, also you will get a lot of shoots that will grow forever if you let them cut these back and let the energy go into the grapes.

Best way I've found to train grape vines is as espaliers - google for pictures. Main idea is one main stem with branches trained horizontally from that at about two foot spacing between. Also you need to remember that the more you prune the more it will try to grow. As for reasonable sized fruit you will need to thin the bunches to around 2 feet apart, and probably thin the actual bunches too. Yes it is painstaking and time consuming, and your vine may not actually be a variety suitable for eating either. However, they do make very good wine. Any idea what variety it is?

The time to prune grapes is February/March so though the autumn prune isn't ideal, it wont do any harm. Unfortunately, the only way to increase or improve your crop is to thin them out - start as soon as you can identify the bunches forming, they'll be like tiny groups of dots. I don't find pruning the grapes borting, just another gardening challenge and eventually, when you have the fruit on the table, it's something you can feel really good about.

I was going to take out the original vine, which is about 20 years old and covers our terrace, because it was so old and overgrown, apart from having to 'manage' the bunches so they don't fall all over the tiles in the summer, it's excellent to provide our grapes.

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TonyF, Dordogne 24220

The time to prune grapes is February/March so though the autumn prune isn't ideal, it wont do any harm. Unfortunately, the only way to increase or improve your crop is to thin them out - start as soon as you can identify the bunches forming, they'll be like tiny groups of dots. I don't find pruning the grapes boring, just another gardening challenge and eventually, when you have the fruit on the table, it's something you can feel really good about.

I was going to take out the original vine, which is about 20 years old and covers our terrace, because it was so old and overgrown, apart from having to 'manage' the bunches so they don't fall all over the tiles in the summer, it's excellent to provide our grapes.

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TonyF, Dordogne 24220