Hello grape lovers!
I hope you are having a nice Easter!
I’ve received this email from Mary Holland, one of the owner’s of the Complete Grape Growers Guide. I will answer her quistens in red and please feel free to leave a comment or ask questions yourself.
BTW, thanks Mary for a very interesting email!
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Hi Danie,
Short answer to your question on why I bought your book is because I am interested in starting either a wine grape nursery for northern US varieties, and/or winery, to transition my husband and me into retirement. Your book seemed to be a quick way to get answers to many questions I had. ………….
Here is a list of questions I’ve accumulated so far reading your book.
1. What do you do for weed control on your vinyard?
Mary, because my farm is 25 hectares (planted), doing mechanical weed control is out of the question. I would take far to long and labour is too expensive. I use Roundup as it has no effect on the vine when sprayed on the old wood (the stems of the vines). I do weed control 3 times a year – before sprouting, mid-season (just before berry enlargement) and once again before harvest (if needed).
On the young vines a use growing plastic tubes that I pull up just before spraying the vines with Roundup. This will prevent the Roundup from getting in contact with the leaves on the training shoots. After I sprayed the Roundup, I will let it dry off and will pull the plastic tubes down again. We farmers call these tube “grape condoms” – lol 
Here is a picture of the condoms in use:
Just remember to pull down the condoms when the Roundup dried off.
2. How do you ever produce enough compost for 84 acres of vinyard?
The soil on my farm is in such great condition because of years and years of looking after it, adding organic material and manure, I hardly use compost. When I plant new vines, and whenever I feel that I need compost, I buy it from a guy who makes compost – he specialize in it.
3. What are your trellis dimensions on the vertical pole, the diagonal poles, and what’s the height of the peak where the poles meet in a gable? Are they tall enough to get a tractor under the canopies? If not, how do you handle harvest equipment?
Here is a more detailed picture of the slanted trellis system I use
4. How do you attach the poles on your trellises to each other?
See picture
5. Looks like you use wood for your trellises – if I can see the photos correctly. Do you treat these and if so how? If not, how long do they last?
Yes it is streated wooden pools, and I buy it that way. One thing I can tell you though; it is treated with tar and it last about 15 years. Whenever a pole brakes, I replace it with a new one. This is an ongoing process and I normally do trellis maintenance on all my vineyards in winter.
6. How far apart are the trellis sections (or another way, how many grapes are planted between runs of trellis supports)?
8 meteres
7. It appears you run a drip irrigation system. Do you inject fertlizer in your irrigation H20 or do you sprinkle dry on and then simply water over it?
As said in the book, I use 32litere/hour micro jets to water the vines and yes I have started to use drip irrigation as well but not open hydrophonics. This is a very specialised field and I do not recommend it for novices. I do sometimes add fertiliser through the water, but only when I see symptoms of shortages.
8. When you are working on your grapes aren’t you working with your arms over your head?
Yes. Hard work, but the best way to train table grapes – period!
9. Do you harvest by hand or mechanically? If the latter, what type of equip do you use or recommend?
Table grapes cannot be harvested mechanically because the berries may not be damaged. My people pick the grapes by hand and put it in a small crate we call a “luc”. It is then removed from the vineyard to the packshed where we pack the grapes in cartons, to export.
10. Ring barking – couldn’t quite see the pic – are you simply making a cut into the bark and cambium, or are you actually removing a strip of bark and cambium? Is it partway around the stem or all the way around? If a strip of bark is removed, how wide?
No, you must remove the old, loos bark before you make the cut. It is a about 1.5 mm cut. Here is the picture again, I hope you can see it more clearly this time. Remember Mary, ring-barking shortens the life of the grape vine. This is not recommended for the home grape grower at all!.
11. I noticed on market prices that price per ton is as much as 10 times different than other prices. The green ton prices are in the 100′s of dollars per ton; the other price is in the thousands. What does this mean, why are they so different?
The price is normally set by the variety and it will differ allot. I’m not sure how they display your prices where you live, but here is ZA, you will be paid more for a good wine variety. I hope this answer this question
Please feel free to post these q’s and a’s. I’d like to see others as well.
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I do agree. Grape Viner’s I would love to answer all your questions, post them in here and I will try my best to get to every single question.
Thanks again Mary, for the email. As said in a previous email, I am working on a grape growing forum, but this will take some time to get up and running. Will keep you posted.
Have a great day
Danie
“The Grape Guy”
www.my-grape-vine.com
Author of the Complete Grape Growers Guide.
