of li lira I A:H and Tade. 



145 



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r 



G-rape Culture in Ohio: 



Its Jixtrnt, I'rof/reMS and I'rospectti, 

 BV M. li. BATEHAM. 



A HORTICULTURAL friend in Pennsyl- 

 lA- vania, who attended some of the pleasant 

 meetings and excursions of our Lake Shore 

 Grape Growers' Association, five or six years 

 ago, writes to me for information respecting 

 the present extent and prospects of grape cul- 

 ture in Ohio, and says the idea has become 

 somewhat prevalent that the business is found 

 to be, in the main, a failure, and many of the 

 Catawba vineyards are abandoned. 



To answer such inquiries and remove erro- 

 neous impressions, I ofter the following statis- 

 tics and observations, which I think will show 

 that we have in Ohio more acres of vineyards 

 than are in any other State of the Union ; and 

 while it is true that grape culture, here as else- 

 where, has not been as uniformly successful, 

 nor as highly profitable as was formerly anti- 

 cipated, it is so far from being a failure that 

 the planting of new vineyards is annually 

 going on, so that the aggregate number of 

 acres is at this time greater than ever before. 



The following table of statistics is compiled 

 from the returns of the township assessors, 

 published annually by the Secretary of State. 

 It is not claimed that the figures are abso- 

 lutely correct, but they are believed to be not 

 far from the truth, and where errors occur 

 they are most commonly in the omission to 

 report the full amounts. 



The table shows the number of acres of 

 vineyards planted, the total number of acres 

 in the State, the pounds of grapes harvested, 

 and gallons of wine pressed, each year, for the 

 four years preceding the past one : 



In this table the aggregate number of.acres 

 in 1872 is partly estimated, as there is an ob- 

 10 



vious error in the published returns from 

 Ottawa county, representing the number quite 

 too great, and swelling the aggregate to over 

 15,000 acres for the State ; but counting the 

 amount of planting and the increase of pre- 

 vious years, it is evident that the aggregate is 

 not far from 12,000 acres. This, of course, 

 does not include the thousands of small 

 patches of grapes for home use, not counted 

 as vineyards. 



In regard to the amount of grapes har- 

 vested, the statistics are not of much value, 

 for it is found that some of the assessors have 

 understood this to include only the grapes sold 

 or shipped to the markets, and not those 

 pressed for wine, while others properly inclu- 

 ded both. It should also be mentioned here, 

 that, in favorable seasons, hundreds of tons of 

 Catawba grapes are shipped from our lake 

 shore region, to other States, for wine making. 



About one-third of the whole amount of 

 vineyards, or 4,000 acres, are located in the 

 counties of Ottawa and Erie (including the 

 islands), near the west end of Lake Erie, and 

 about 2,000 acres more in the adjoining coun- 

 ties of Lorain and Cuyahoga, on the lake 

 shore, making one-half of the aggregate for 

 the State ; the balance, 6,000 acres, is pretty 

 widely scattered, the hilly lands on the Ohio 

 river, and in the coal regions, having a fair 

 share. It is noticeable, too, that while there 

 has been very little planting, and no increase 

 at all, of late yeai's, in the aggregate of the 

 lake shore region, nearly all the planting and 

 increase has been in the interior counties of 

 the State, where small vineyards, mostly of 

 the Concord variety, are found profitable for 

 supplying fruit to the local markets. 



Of the vineyards on the lake shore and 

 islands, full seven-eights are Catawba, and I 

 should say that nine-tenths of the wine manu- 

 fiictured is of this variety — though there is a 

 considerable amount of Ives and Concord 

 wine made at Cincinnati and other towns in 

 southern Ohio, and some at Cleveland, San- 

 dusky and Toledo; also, small amounts of 

 Delaware and Norton. 



The business of wine making is now car- 

 ried on with much more of capital and skill 



