CHAPTER II. 



PRELIMINARY PREPARATIONS FOR TRAINING THE 



TRELLIS TYING. 



Training the grape vine is practiced for the pur- 

 pose of keeping the vine in convenient shape and 

 to allow each cluster to receive its full amount of 

 space and light. A well trained vine is easily cul- 

 tivated and sprayed, and the grapes are readily 

 harvested, and it is only upon such vines that the 

 best and fairest fruit is uniformly produced. Some 

 kind of training is essential, for a vine will not often 

 bear good fruit when it lies upon the ground. In 

 essence, there are three general types or styles of 

 training, which may be designated as the upright, 

 drooping and horizontal, these terms designating 

 the direction of the bearing shoots. The upright 

 systems carry two or more canes or arms along a 

 low horizontal wire, or sometimes obliquely across 

 a trellis from below upwards, and the shoots are 

 tied up as they grow to the wires above. The hori- 

 zontal systems carry up a perpendicular cane or 

 arm, or sometimes two or more, from which the 

 shoots are carried out horizontally and are tied to 

 perpendicular wires or posts. The drooping sys- 

 tems, represented in the Kniffin and post-training, 

 carry the canes or arms upon a high horizontal wire 



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