8 Vineyard Culture. 



[Our experience in this country has led us to similar con- 

 clusions, though the most intelligent grape growers express 

 themselves very much at fault, when asked to describe the 

 best "grape lands" We find the vine cultivated with success 

 and profit in the sands of New Jersey ; indeed, some varieties 

 appear to escape the mildew, in such soil, that suffer from the 

 malady elsewhere. 



On the pebbly drift of the Hudson, some vines have been 

 remarkably successful. On a similar, but more fertile soil, in 

 western New York, and in Pennsylvania, on Lake Erie, the 

 grape-culture has been very successful, and along the same 

 shore we -find the vine yielding most satisfactory results on the 

 light, sandy soils, on the rich limestone clays, and even in the 

 close, heavy, whitish clays of the shales, some of which look 

 cold and repulsive enough to the farmer. All of these are 

 respectively called "grape-soils" and are claimed to possess 

 peculiar advantages. 



In the blue-grass region were planted some of the first 

 vineyards of the West. The French in Kentucky, and the 

 Swiss at Vevay, Indiana, selected the rich, heavy clays of this 

 limestone region, which occupies a circle around Cincinnati 

 that would be described by a radius of fifty miles. Within this 

 magic ring the first and the first successful efforts at grape- 

 culture were made. The soils here are sufficiently heavy, 

 and by some are considered too rich for the profitable culture 

 of the vine. 



The limey clays, tempered with the detritus of sandstones, 

 as found in the coal-measures, have also been very successfully 

 planted with the grape, about Pittsburgh and Wheeling, and 

 at some other points. In the prairies of Illinois, the grape 

 has been grown on black soils, but it can hardly be said with 

 success, except upon the borders of the Mississippi, where it 

 is chiefly planted on the loess deposit, which also prevails to 



