112 MAXUAL OF AMERICAN GRAPE-GROWING 



to increase the vigor of the plant. (2) The promotion of the 

 formation of fruit-buds. The first, in common parlance, is 

 pruning for wood ; the second, pruning for fruit. 



Pruning for wood. 



Some grapes, in common with \'arieties of all fruits, produce 

 excessive crops of fruit so that the plants exhaust themselves, 

 to their permanent injury and to the detriment of the crop. 

 Something must be done to restore and increase vegetative 

 vigor. The most natural procedure is to lessen the struggle for 

 existence among the parts of the plant. The richer and the 

 more abundant the supply of the food solution, the greater 

 the vegetative activity, the larger the leaves and the larger and 

 stouter the internodes. Obviously, the supply of food solu- 

 tion for each bud may be increased by decreasing the number of 

 buds. The weaker the phmts, therefore, the more the vine 

 should be cut. The severe pruning in the first two years of the 

 vine's existence is an example of pruning for wood. The vine 

 is pruned for wood in the resting period between the fall of leaf 

 and the swelling of buds the following spring. 



Pruning for fruit. 



Growers of all fruits soon learn that excessive vegetative 

 vigor is not usually accompanied by fruitfulness. Too great 

 vigor is indicated by long, leafy, unbranching shoots. Some 

 fruit-growers go so far as to say that fruitfulness is inversely 

 proportionate to vegetative vigor. There are several methods 

 of diminishing the vigor of the vine ; as, withholding water 

 and fertilizers, stopping tillage, the method of training and by 

 pruning. Pruning is used to decrease the vigor of the vine, 

 in theory at least, for the practice is not always so successful, 

 by pruning the roots or by summer-pruning the shoots. 



Root-pruning the grape at intervals of several years is a 

 regular practice with some varieties in warm countries, Eu- 



