REPORT OF COMMITTEE ON PUBLICATION 51 



buds more per vine could be left without injury to them. Yet in this vine- 

 yard the fruit matures poorly unless the fruiting wood is reduced much below 

 what, the season's growth would indicate, should be put up. 



In the Chautauqua Belt a crop of four tons of Concord to the acre is 

 considered a very good one. As the more recent plantings are made in rows 

 eight feet apart and the vines are spaced eight feet in the row, this yield 

 would be borne by about 680 vines at an average of 11.8 pounds per vine. 

 In order to return this yield, from forty to fifty clusters will be required 

 from each vine. The buds for furnishing this amount of fruit may be on 

 canes, on spurs or a combination of both. As each shoot bears from two to 

 three clusters, usually two, and as some buds may be imperfect, be broken 

 off in the tying, or the shoots injured later, it is well to leave more buds 

 than is actually required to furnish the desired amount of fruit. Under 

 unfavorable conditions, the same number of buds will not produce equal 

 amounts of grapes in any two seasons, so that the principle advantage in a 

 consideration of the number to be retained is in gauging overbearing rather 

 than as a forecast of the crop. In some seasons, the secondary buds produce 

 at least one marketable cluster in addition to the two or three returned by 

 the primary ones. It is to be preferred that the vines be underpruned 

 rather than over. 



The time for pruning American varieties varies considerably with vine- 

 yardists, varieties and localities, but as a rule, the period extends from the 

 falling of the leaves in the fall to just before the swelling of the buds in the 

 spring. Some vineyardists even prune after the sap flow has become vigor- 

 ous, claiming no injury therefrom. It has been observed that when this 

 late pruning is done, and the sap flows down over the lower buds, that a 

 freeze severely injures and often kill those covered with sap. And from 

 this standpoint alone, late pruning is not to be recommended. As there is 

 a considerable sap flow within the vine even before there are external evi- 

 dences of it, it is best not to delay the pruning in order to lessen frost injury, 

 through retardation of the exfoliating buds. Thus far we are not able to see 

 any favorable affects on fruitfulness from late pruning. It is good practice 

 to delay the pruning until after one or more severe freezes in the fall and 

 early winter, as an index of the maturity of the wood. The immature canes 

 will wither, and the poorly ripened tips will be killed back, thus making it 

 possible to discard any such for the next years' supply of fruiting wood. 

 Late fall or early winter pruning are desirable from the fact that a large 

 amount of food from the canes will have undergone translocation to the 

 stem and lower parts of the vine and hence is not lost to the vine by their 

 early removal. It is quite probable that under ordinary conditions trans- 

 location has been completed at the end of the second or third week after 

 leaf fall. As soon as sap flow begins in the spring the food in the stem and 

 larger roots is carried to the canes and arms again and if the pruning be 

 delayed till this time, it will be removed with the wood cut away. There is 

 no reason physiologic or otherwise why American varieties cannot be pruned 

 to the best advantage any time between these periods of translocation if the 

 vines have well matured wood. But if the wood is not such, the work should 

 not be begun until after severe freezes. In sections where snow covers the 

 ground, a greater part of the winter, the pruning should be done as far as 

 possible when the least amount is on, so that access can be had to the growth 



