General Notices. 265 



xMISCELLANEOUS INTELLIGENCE. 



Art. I. General Notices. 



CuUivalion of Grape Vines. — Complaints are frequently made of the 

 loss, or partial loss, of a crop of grapes when there could be no apparent 

 cause. Often the vines which appear strong push weakly, and show only 

 one bunch of fruit, and that of small size. IJeep planting and a deep bor- 

 der are too often the cause of all the bad effects experienced, and a corre- 

 spondent of the Gardeners^ Journal, having failed to procure a good crop, 

 requested information, to which the following is a reply : as it is the best of 

 advice, we copy it here. — Ed. 



As 'J. VV. R.' (p. 117.) wishes for advice from some of your corre- 

 spondents concerning the failure of his vines, I venture a few remarks. 

 As he has not said any thing about the border, I am led to conjecture that 

 the roots must be lying too deep, and out of the influence of the sun — this 

 being the primary cause of all the ills the vine is heir to. My advice is to 

 get some vine eyes put in immediately, which he can get from those that 

 have been grown out of doors against wallsj as those in-doors are breaking. 

 Then, if the vines should fail this year, lose no time in cutting them down ; 

 train one rod to each rafter, which will allow ample room to grow the vines 

 in pots to fill the house next year, independent of the others. If they 

 should require to be cut down, he had better examine his border, and see 

 what state the roots are in ; and, if they are deep, I would at once remove 

 the old soil, at least two feet deep, and get in some good turfy loam, rather 

 light than otherwise, and make it up again : if some of the smaller roots 

 can be brought up, so much the belter. See that there is a good drain, 

 sufficiently deep to carry off all superfluous water, as every other efl^ect 

 would be useless (particularly if the border is on a level with the original 

 surface,) if that be not well attended to. If the stems are outside of the 

 house, and there is room to raise the border at least a foot, there will be no 

 need to take more than a foot of the old soil away, as that would allow of 

 two feet of fresh. If ' J. W. R.' thinks proper to try this plan, I do not 

 think he will have cause to regret ; as I have been so situated myself, and 

 I can testify to the good effects produced by so treating them. I have a 

 small vinery, 36 feet long by 10 feet wide, which served me in the way 

 complained of — two years producing nothing but blind bunches. I grew 

 eighteen vines in pots, on Mr. Wright's system, and some of them showed 

 as many as thirty bunches. I intend to take this year two hundred bunches, 

 ten bunches from each of the rafters, and six from each pot, the plants in 

 which are trained between the rafters ; they are now beginning to come 

 into flower, and promise well. There is a pit in the house which I have 

 made into a border, where the pots are plunged three or four inches, which 

 will materially assist them in swelling off" their fruit. I find any sort of 

 grape will do for pots. I have four sorts, and all are equally fruitful. By 

 this system I may say I am taking two crops of grapes without distressing 



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