How Many Varieties to Start?

[Texas Winer]

Hi Willow Homestead!
Ann from Texas here and my husband and I are hobby farmers and a vineyard is my hobby. We just picked what was designated to grow well in our zone (8a) and so far some are doing better than others. I have had to resign myself to the fact that some may not make it, but so far (after a long and arduous road to get here) they all seem to be doing very well. We had them in large buckets until July and had to plant around the 20th. It is not ideal, but sometimes nature just knows what to do and it seems to be doing it. I'm in Northeast Texas, Red River County, so we have lots of water and humidity. I'd say just pick what kind of wine you want to make, thats what I did, so I have 5 white rows and 3 red, surprisingly the red are doing the best!
Good luck to you!

 

[richinsd]

How many times a year are you willing to harvest?

 

[wfournier]

I'm in western MA, and we went with 5 varieties: Marquette, Petite Pearl, Verona, Itasca, and Le Crescent. If i did it over i might go with less. Grapes ripen at different times, and having more varieties means more of everything: more harvesting (at least spread out), more cleaning of equipment etc, more carboys to monitor, etc. Plan how you are going to net them now as well. Lay out your rows to match netting sizes etc.