# Grapes!



## deboard (Aug 12, 2011)

I thought I'd post a couple pictures of my cynthiana/norton grapes which are currently ripening. I had 8 plants in the trellis sytem, but I also had a couple of vines that I just planted next to a box trellis closer to the house. 

The trellised vines didn't produce anything this year due to a late frost, but that might be moot since I probably would have pinched them off given it's only the second season. 

One plant on the box trellis managed to survive the frost, and produced a few clusters. I gave in and let it grow since it was just the one vine. 

Anyway, they are starting to ripen now, here are some pictures. My plan is to use a VH black currant and mix these grapes in and see what happens since they are not enough on their own to make much.


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## Minnesotamaker (Aug 12, 2011)

Looking good. Not much longer now.


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## Wade E (Aug 13, 2011)

Hopefully ina few years they will prodcue enough to make straight batches for you but some is better then none right. I think the VH + those will come out very good!


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## deboard (Aug 13, 2011)

I think so too Wade, the straight VH black currant turned out very good for me, in fact I had one full bottle that I didn't backsweeten at all, and after aging a while I tried it and I like it better than the sweeter version. So this batch will be dry.


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## robie (Aug 13, 2011)

Always a beautiful site to see.


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## mwestern (Aug 13, 2011)

*Looks Great !!*

Has anyone had any black rot problems this year besides us ? We've been spraying and suckering the plants to try to keep things drier but we still have alittle bit loss. Mike


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## Racer (Aug 13, 2011)

I've had a little bit of black rot this year on the grapes. But anthracnose hit some of my vines really good earlier in the season. I got both under control so far and am looking at having a decent harvest if the rain doesn't hit the vines too hard before it's time to pick.


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## deboard (Aug 14, 2011)

Not positive what black rot looks like, but some of the leaves on my vines have turned brown around the edges and fell off. Seems to be pretty mild though, just a few. 

Had a few japanese beetles of course, sevin seems to keep that in check. I also did one anti-fungal dusting about a month ago, but I didn't really see anything wrong, just preventative and paranoid. 

I'm preparing to put the bird netting on, I've read that it can get frustrating and I get frustrated easily. But I do not want to lose these grapes to the birds, they ate every raspberry I had, the exact moment they were at perfect ripeness.


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## mwestern (Aug 14, 2011)

*Some good info from good people*

After picking the brains of people who will give away their secrets we found that spraying with simple baking soda with a heavy mix will help alot with black rot also the brother-inlaw farms and he supplied some Pennco Zeb 75df manganese & zinc powder plus Dupont Kocide 2000 copper fungicide to spray and the grapes have benefited well.Black rot is the black circles on grapes and every grape it touches gets infected also the dried "mummies" that fall off can also infect next years crop,we got all this info from the local colleges data bank and it has helped.We only have 5 rows so we covered the whole area with weed barrier and mulched the entire area it looks great and has knocked down the bad stuff a bunch.So much for an easy past time. ;-)


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