22 AMERICAN GEAPE GROWING 



Goethe. I have not practiced it in the East, but tried it 

 in California thoroughly and without success. The 

 summers are too hot for it, and so it has to be done in 

 June and July, above ground. I believe that it will 

 never be generally practiced in America. To make it 

 succeed at all, the grafts must be shaded in some way. 

 As we must, in this practical country, try to reduce ex- 

 penses to a minimum and plan for quickest returns, the 

 method of cleft grafting described above will be found 

 to alone fulfill the desired conditions. I do not, there- 

 fore, consider it worth while to describe minutely other 

 methods of but little value to the practical grape grower. 

 I sum up briefly in a few rules, which I have taken as 

 my guide here, where grafting plays such a very im- 

 portant part in viticulture. 



1. Let your stocks be chosen with a view of their 

 adaptation to the soil, and do not graft until they are 

 strong enough, say from an inch to an inch and a half 

 in diameter. 



2. Choose your cions with great care, of medium, 

 short-jointed, well-ripened wood of last season's growth, 

 and keep them dormant, in a cool place, covered with 

 sand or earth. 



3. Wait until the sap in the stock is in rapid motion, 

 at least until the buds swell, and then perform the oper- 

 ation quickly, taking care that the inner barks of stock 

 and cion fit closely. 



4. Leave buds enough on the cion to elaborate and 

 circulate all the sap, thereby avoiding black knot and 

 all diseases which are apt to follow late frosts, excessive 

 pruning, etc. 



5. Hill up around the junction so as to protect it 

 from drying out and to protect the graft, but do not tie 

 or put on grafting wax or clay, as by so doing you may 

 drown and rot the cion. 



