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The Grape Culturist. 



Allow me at the same time a few i*e- 

 marks about those papers. Your 

 Grape Culturist I think is necessary 

 for every one who cultivates the grape, 

 and I know from experience it has 

 clone and will do good. But, ray dear 

 sir, please remember that you find 

 among all the grape growers in this 

 country three-fifths whose experience 

 in grape growing is but a few j'ears 

 old^ therefore give us your Grape 

 CuLTCRisT in the most plain, distinct, 

 and clearest way possible. You will 

 always have among your readers a 

 goodly number who do not know the 

 meaning of " renewal system of train- 

 ing," " spurrengin," ''spur pruned," 

 and other such expressions. IIow few 

 of your readers Jvuow anything about 

 making Avine, and also about a good 

 many expressions related thereto- 

 Please tell us this year in plain words 

 how to train best the ditferent varieties, 

 how to raise spurs o\\ old arms for the, 

 as you say, " Cordifolia" class,(why not 

 "Frost Grape ?") and how to treat each 

 variety of grape best to make it into 

 wine, how to handle must, to weigh it, 

 how warm it ought to be, and whether 

 the must to be weiglied, han to be 

 filtered, and all such things. 



I have growing about 2,000 apples, 

 500 pears, plums, etc., about 5,000 

 grape vines, some forty varieties, all 

 planted with my own hands in the last 

 six years, and most of it raised myself, 

 because I am a poor man. Now, I 

 have to know how to make wine, citier, 

 vinegar, etc., and to make good arti- 

 cles which can be sold. "Will the 

 ^^JVeios" teach me those things? I am 

 afraid not ; they may be good enough 

 for those men who know how to make 

 these thing?;, and, as that sample cop}-^ 



says, will tell such producers the new 

 improvements and diseoveries ; but I 

 wish before anything it would give us 

 the ABC in sucli matters. There are 

 hundreds and hundreds in such situa- 

 tions, and almost every year thousands 

 of dollars worth of fruit is gone to 

 waste, because we don't know how to 

 produce a merchantable product of it. 

 Yours truly, Ed. Roelfs. 



[We confess that the above acted 

 rather depressing upon our feelings^ 

 for several reasons. We had so far 

 been vain enough to suppose that we 

 could write plain English, nay had 

 even thought we \\ ere too plain some- 

 times, to judge from letters received 

 fi*om others ; we had also believed that 

 all of our grape growers could under- 

 stand us, and that nearly every one was 

 familiar with the meaning of such words 

 as our correspondent mentions ; and, 

 lastl}', we thought that the letter box 

 was open to every one, if he wished 

 information, to ask it, and we would 

 try to furnish it. We judge, however, 

 from the tone ot his letter, that he is 

 not ignorant of the meaning of all the 

 terms, and if he will ask information 

 on " one at a time," we will tiy and 

 give it to him or any one else of our 

 readers, in the plainest terms we are 

 able to use. Therefore, good friends, 

 send in your questions and we will an- 

 swer if we can ; although we do not 

 profess to ""know every thing," and 

 hope to learn a good deal from you. 

 Of course, 'we cannot say what the 

 " Zymotechnic News " will do, but we 

 know friend Frings to be accommoda- 

 ting, and think he will also tiy to in- 

 form you as " well " as he knows how. 

 Thanks for the interesting statistics 

 sent. Can you not also tell us how 



