174 Wisconsix State Horticultural Society. 







f- The grapes growing near the soil will ripen first. That is one 

 advantage of this bow system, to bring them down. They keep 

 warm on a southwest slope. The evening sun goes down on them, 

 and it makes the ground hot there, and it will stay hot, and warm 

 them in the night. When the grape vines are blossoming, the old 

 saying in Germany is, that the vineyard man ought to sleep in the 

 vineyard without a coat. It wants warm, hot weather, and ninety 

 degrees is about right. With that temperature, three days from 

 the first blossoming you will see little grapes. 



Mr. Field — What time would you tie them down? 



Mr. Hofer — Just as soon as a warm rain comes in March or 

 April; tie them back to a foot from the ground, and they will hang 

 around just like a wreath. The pole is to support the prospective 

 canes, to tie them to, and protect them against the storm. If any 

 of you come to McGregor next fall, come to my vineyard, in Au- 

 gust, or even in June, or any time next summer, when they begin 

 to grow, and I can show you more than I can tell you here. People 

 come ten and twenty miles, and just stop in the hotel, and walk up 

 to my little vineyard to look at it. 



Mr. Plumb — Would you cut your vines when they are in bloom? 



Mr. Hofer — It is not good for them; they are so tender then, 

 and you would disturb the bees. The honey bee is a great lover of 

 the grape vine, and we Germans believe it is necessary that the bee 

 should fly from one vine to another. I don't know whether there 

 is anything in it or not, but we do not work in it there, and it is not 

 well to do so; you shake the poles or disturb them, and in blossom- 

 ing time we keep out; we think it pays better. It is only three 

 days; if they blossom longer than three days it is not well for 

 them. There is one thing I did not speak of yet. We have only 

 two causes by which we should lose our crop, and these are, first, 

 by the Mayor June frost after they have sprouted, and, second, by 

 having wet, cold weather during blossoming time. If they begin 

 to blossom, and a cold, sleeting rain comes and lasts two or three 

 days, it is very apt to diminish the crop; still it does not do so here 

 as much as it does in Germany. They are really more easily raised 

 here, and with less trouble, than in Germany. 



Mr. Periam — I would like to say a few words in relation to this 

 question, for the reason that I have been something of a grape 

 grower myself. There is one special point of improvement that Mr. 



