# How far apart should you plant vines?



## wzazdzez (Sep 26, 2011)

How far apart should you plant cabernets and merlots? And should you put posts between every vine? And how many wire trellis and how tall? Thanks in advance for any info. _____________"There's many a slip twixt the cup and the lip."


----------



## Manimal (Sep 29, 2011)

Vine spacing is largely dependent upon the vigour potential of your site. If you are planting in a site with poor fertility soil, low precipitation levels and good drainage you would likely want to plant closer than if you are planting in an area with highly fertile soil and lots of precipitation, since the vigour restricting conditions will limit vine size. 

In the second scenario of high fertility and plentiful rainfall, if the vines were planted too closely they would crowd each other and create a lot of problems with dense canopies, shade, poor fruitfullness and increased disease pressure. That being said, in cases of extremely dry conditions wide spacing is generally practiced also so that the vines do not compete deleteriously with eachother for the limited water resources.

For more specific recommendations about vine spacing and as far as trellis height and post spacing, wires, etc. goes, I think you need to do some serious research and ask questions which are a bit more pointed based on your specific conditions. There are simply too many variables and schools of thought to give you any really useful guidance without some insight to your soil/climate conditions and eventual goals in terms of wine styles, yield, etc.


----------



## jtstar (Sep 29, 2011)

Go buy a book called From Vine To Wine you will find it on Amazon it is an excellant book on this subject.


----------



## Teamsterjohn (Oct 1, 2011)

I have that book and it was a big help to me.


----------

