Dear Infidel Western Gardener....Proof of Life

"Let this be your Prook of Life Infidel Western Gardener! We have the fair beauty 'Krasavitsa Moskvy'.  Our tendrils have scaled her fair frame in several places blocking her light!"

 Dear Infidel Western Gardener:

We here in The Garden know you have grown fat and lazy with your recent success and acclaim from your capitalist Master Gardeners Garden Walk.  You think you can sit back and read glowing thank you cards and full page write-ups in beautiful full color in your week(ly) capitalist press.   Now is our time to strike!  We, the Wine Grapes, Othello and poor dumb B who is known by a number only, have organized the other thug garden plants.

"We have also clambered onto cherry 'Lapin'.  He is young, we may yet convert him to the True Path!"

"Here we show you we have 'Honeycrisp', too!  Easy prey for us as our hearts are true and our Evil Plan for World Domination will not be denied!"

"We have lived with you for years, fitting into your landscape design, learning your pruning and weeding ways!"

"You may think you foiled our evil plans when you cut off two 25-foot sections of akebia quinata which had taken the arborvitae twins hostage, but we will not give up!  More of our brothers stand ready to sacrifice their tendrils in the name of our Holy Cause!"

"Meanwhile, our brother-in-arms Gooseneck Loosestrife, A.K.A. Lysimachia clethroides languishes in your gardener's prison, contained between your house and a stone path!"

"Wormwood 'Oriental Limelight' A.K.A. Artemesia vulgaris Janlim also struggles in nearly full shade positioned in front of a mirror!  Who has heard of such crazy gardening ways!"

We demand you release our brethren plants!  There are more plants in The Garden which will join our cause!  The seedlings of catalpa overrun your beds and with the last week's heat grow mighty in their resistance to your ways as do grass turkey foot, quack, and our loyal friend walnut! 

Campanula horribilis launches her own evil plan giving us a two prong attack; and her minions are legion!


Lily of the Valley may yet come over and join with us in Our Cause.  Those fancy daylilies may yet see The Light!

We saw you out there on hands and knees ignoring us in your garden beds and borders, hand-pulling our brother turkey foot and crab where your dumb dog has made your lawn weak and willing to allow our take-over of your institutions.  The time you waste mowing the lawn works for us in our Evil Plan for World Domination.


We demand you free our brethren, lay down your pruners and join us on the True Path!!!

Simply continue your lazy ways.  We will yet triumph!

(signed)

The Grapevines Othello and poor dumb B known as a number only

Growing Grapes at the Hancock Research Station

The UW-Extension has a well-written booklet on growing grapes in Wisconsin. When Handsome Son was nine, he and I took part in the grape pruning clinic the station holds each spring. Then, they let you take some of the clippings from which are very easy to start your own plants.

The growing system is simplistic. Two wires strung between 8' posts sunk two feet into the ground. Grapes tied up on the wires with hay bailer twine in the spring after pruning.

The one thing the pamphlet, which can be downloaded free of charge as a PDF, is not exceptionally good at is pictures showing the ideal pruning structure. I would say I have never seen this pruning style, which I refer to as the Vitruvius Man, illustrated quite as were as it is seen on these 'Mars' seedless grapes. Pictures are worth a thousand words.

They had six or so varieties growing, in order of what I would say expected yields given the hanging grapes this season of heaviest to lightest; Mars, Edleweiss, Frontenac, Blue Belle, Unknown, Othello.

You can clearly see these grapes are completely cold hardy here in central Wisconsin by the size of the main trunk on this grape, which resembles a tree rather than a vine.

Spring...

INSTALLING SPRING...

Installing spring
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Feels that way!

I am attempting things this year gardening under lights that I would never have thought particularly worthwhile in the past. We have had years recently where we have not had frost after April 1. More frequently, the two periods of full moon between April 1 and our average last frost date, sometime around the third week in May, will bring gardeners a periodic pause to cover things with sheets or bring in tender hanging baskets for the night.

This year, this spring, is atypical. I would guess soil temps are below 40 degrees. If the snow would melt, I would find my soil thermometer and have at it. As it is, I have to dig a hole to find the garden.

So today, I planted soaked peas in a 128-cell flat, indoors, instead. The way they are going they will be better than the ones in the snow. I'll let you know.

Checking in on the progress of other garden "inquiries":

The cut-off nubs from the bottom of the celery bunch-- looked good about a week after planting and then ran out of steam, droopy-looking and dies.

The iceberg lettuce cores--transplanted to the garden. They looked good before the snow. Not sure now, though.

Pruned grapes--usually by April 7, when I actually got to pruning them, the buds are typically starting to unfurl tiny leaves. This year? No change since the end of March. They are a good 3 weeks behind. They usually are ready to pick about September 11-19. I'll let you know if this summer is a bust. Three weeks late puts us into the average first fall frost date of October 5.

Pruning a Hedge

Hedges are the way we gardeners establish our boundaries. For me, establishing some sort of boundary between my property and the gravel public alleyways that abut my property on two sides has been a challenge.

When I bought the property it had two massive, hollow widowmaker type boxelders at each of the back corners of my lot. I had them taken down. Boxelders are very much a weed tree and do not serve any sort of esoteric function for my gardener's soul. At the one outside corner I put a couple balsam firs. These became the anchors for what has become a fairly deciduous hedge of shrubs and fruit trees.

Along two sections of these length of the alley I planted privet cuttings, which has served very well as a hedge. Instead of trimming them into rectangular boxes that do not serve the growth of the plant, I trim them narrower at the top and wider closer to ground, giving them a rounded shape. You can see their structure during the winter and early spring.

This cultivar of privet has a glossier green sheen to the leaf, holds its leaves until almost the beginning of December here, and leafs out fairly early, in April. I took these cuttings from a branch of privet that acted differently in my yard in Elgin, IL. This hedge is about four years old. It is about 2 feet tall and 2 1/2 feet wide.

Pruning Grapes and Leonardo di Vinci's Vitruvian Man

Well, it was an incredibly beautiful, SEASONAL spring day, today. I called the village library to check with our very own village weather prognosticator; yes, the village SNOW WITCH! So what's up? Is spring here?

I call. "Is the Snow Witch in?" "No," comes the casual reply. "So, is her forecast still posted for the year?" The librarian on duty doesn't hesitate, just gives me the bad news.

"The Snow Witch says three more measurable snowfalls."

Damn! I asked, "When was she last in to update her findings?"

"She came by this morning," was the droll reply. Damn! Damn! Damn!

You see, our village Snow Witch is not wrong about these things. Further consultation with the weather prognosticators in the village gives additional information; one of the snow falls will be a heavy one.

"Ugh!" My mother had crocus blooming this morning. My hepatica are green! Come on!

No wonder the Snow Witch is not in!

Regardless, today I begin working on my yard. I still have a couple feet of snow in places. I rake where I can. This is the latest in six years I have pruned my grapes. They are on my list for today.



If you have never pruned your grapes, the chore may seem incomprehensible. If that is the case, I recommend cutting off all but 6'to 7' of the vines so you can see what you you are doing.


This picture shows two grape vines clipped back to 6' or 7'. I did that in the fall.



Next keep in mind, that if you mess it up, there will be a next year. When keeping grapes, your goal to to prune them to increase your yield. I like to trim back the vines to 6' to 7' in the fall to remove material that may have been exposed to fungal diseases. I leave the rest to provide additional protection in the winter to the crown.

During the growing season I tie my grapes to wires running north and south strung between two 4' posts. This allows the prevailing NW to SE winds to provide good air circulation. This is supposed to prevent diseases. Grapes are susceptible to many of the same diseases and pests which affect roses. To date, I have not been affected by any pests, nor diseases.

I have tried to illustrate a couple things. The red parts are the oldest parts of my grape vines. Those sections boxed in pink our this last year's growth. The wires I have high-lighted in blue. Three years ago's growth is orange. The year before last is in yellow.


These parts I have circled in yellow are last year's growth. Cut them back so you can see what you are doing. The bark on the vine that appears to be peeling is typical of a grape vine and nothing to be concerned about (green rectangle).


The first year, I let them grow. The next year, I started to try and see the form of Leonardo di Vinci's "Vitruvian Man". The farther you get from the trunk of the grape the less vitality the budding spurs have. Also, you want to prune before too much energy is expended with leaf development. In central Wisconsin, you want to prune before April 10, preferably between the last weekend in March and first weekend in April.

Circled in yellow are the coming fruiting buds for this year.


These vines actually were tip die-back and are dead. This is why I do not do my pruning all the way back in the fall.


These vines are some left from last year's growth. Cutting these into foot-long lengths and burying about 2/3 of each in a potting medium, keeping them moist, and placing them in a protected spot will encourage them to root. I usually use Rootone to root them and get 100% to root. They root so easily, if you wanted to forgo the Rootone, they would most like root anyway. In that case, I would attempt to root a few extra to be sure I got the number I intended to plant.


All finished!

I have two grape varieties, Frontenac and Othello. My vines are approximately 6 years old now. The second year in the ground, one of the vines were inadvertently clipped off at the ground. I thought at the time that was to be the end of the one, but the next year it grew back, only lagging for a year or so (the one circled in green).

You want to leave 6" to 18" of branching running off from the trunk both left and right at two levels (equivalent to the legs and arms). The length of the branches should include two to three bud spurs. When you have mature vines you will eight to twelve fruiting buds per plant. Think of "Vitruvian Man" when pruning.

Grapes do not like competition with grass and weeds. I do have mine underplanted with strawberries, which seems to work well, however. I use a 10-10-10 fertilizer and water them on a weekly basis. To have grapes grow well, the most important ingredient is that they be well-watered, especially when the grapes are growing quickly after the summer solstice.