After getting about 6 gallons of juice from a ~100kg harvest last year, I'm wondering if I'm missing something.... <begins essay!>
It's a single vine, planted in the mid 1950's, trained overhead, and has a spread of about 9m x 4m. I took about 2 hundredweight off it last year, and about the same again left behind for the wasps. It still shoots vigorously and I'm training it across to an additional run of poles for next year. It has been suggested that it's a Babeasca Neagra variety, but others in the village reckon it's just a local red grape with no particular heritage.. At time of picking, some grapes were still a little pale; others were already shrivelling or had the first signs of bloom/mildew coating on them. Left alone, the juice ferments very readily all by itself.
We're next door to a residential home for disabled adults, and they love to pick off the stalks and crush by hand, in return for loud music (usually Marley), snacks and conversation, and a gallon of must a few days later once it's got some fizz to it! I only get about three weeks from picking to first racking, and can't guarantee being there at anywhere near perfect ripeness.
Now, after crushing into some plastic barrels and settling, there seemed to be an /awful/ lot of waste after drawing the juice, especially the wee sac that the seeds are in.
MainQuestion: Should I aim to break down / crush the seed sac to increase yield? Or am i supposed to work with only the free juice?
SubQuestion: Given limited funds - would it be worth investing in either a manual press or a manual crusher (some of my crushing volunteers don't have much hand strength TBH). The quality of the available equiment is Chinese-export-to-Romania quality ~ you expect to spend a few days fettling your purchase before doing any useful work with it.
It's a single vine, planted in the mid 1950's, trained overhead, and has a spread of about 9m x 4m. I took about 2 hundredweight off it last year, and about the same again left behind for the wasps. It still shoots vigorously and I'm training it across to an additional run of poles for next year. It has been suggested that it's a Babeasca Neagra variety, but others in the village reckon it's just a local red grape with no particular heritage.. At time of picking, some grapes were still a little pale; others were already shrivelling or had the first signs of bloom/mildew coating on them. Left alone, the juice ferments very readily all by itself.
We're next door to a residential home for disabled adults, and they love to pick off the stalks and crush by hand, in return for loud music (usually Marley), snacks and conversation, and a gallon of must a few days later once it's got some fizz to it! I only get about three weeks from picking to first racking, and can't guarantee being there at anywhere near perfect ripeness.
Now, after crushing into some plastic barrels and settling, there seemed to be an /awful/ lot of waste after drawing the juice, especially the wee sac that the seeds are in.
MainQuestion: Should I aim to break down / crush the seed sac to increase yield? Or am i supposed to work with only the free juice?
SubQuestion: Given limited funds - would it be worth investing in either a manual press or a manual crusher (some of my crushing volunteers don't have much hand strength TBH). The quality of the available equiment is Chinese-export-to-Romania quality ~ you expect to spend a few days fettling your purchase before doing any useful work with it.
