16 AMERICAN GRAPE GROWING 



CHAPTER II. 



PROPAGATION OF THE VINES. BY SEEDS. 



While the raising of grape vines from the seed is more 

 a labor of love, than of actual profit, yet its influence on 

 grape culture generally has been so great, and we are 

 already indebted so largely to its zealous followers, that 

 it cannot be entirely omitted in a work like this. We 

 can not gain further perfection in varieties without this, 

 and the success which has already attended the labors 

 of Rogers, Wylie, Campbell, Ricketts, Muench, Miller, 

 Weydemeier, Langendoerfer, and especially Mr. Jacob 

 Rommel, in giving to us the Elvira, and other varieties 

 still more promising, affords hopes of even more impor- 

 tant results. 



To begin then at the beginning : choose your seed from 

 a good stock. I am inclined to believe that only the 

 CBstii)alis and cordifolia (or riparia, as Engelmann has 

 it) species will give us the true wine grapes of the country, 

 and if we can increase their size somewhat, they will also 

 be the best table grapes. We have them already as large 

 as the Catawba, and they are more juicy, of finer flavor, 

 and less pulpy than the varieties from the Labrusca 

 species, while they are much more healthy and hardy. 

 Remember that we have already too many varieties, and 

 that every new one we add should have some decided 

 merit over any of the old varieties, or else be discarded at 

 once. 



Choose the best berries and the most perfect bunches, 

 from which to take the seed, and either sow in autumn, 

 and cover, or keep them over winter, mixing the seeds 

 with moist sand, when separated from the pulp, to insure 

 ready germination. Sow early in spring, in well pulver- 

 ized clay soil, in drills one foot apart, and drop the seeds 



