THE CANADIAN nOBTICULTURIST. 



199 



bee. This is eminently a wine grape. 

 Soine of the cultivated varieties are — 

 Clinton, from which i.s derived mo.st of 

 Arnold's hybrids, whicli have the Clin- 

 ton, for one of their parents. All the 

 grapes of this class grow readily from 

 cuttings ; it makes the best grafting 

 stock for foreign varieties, the roots 

 being free from the luvages of phyl- 

 loxera. Millions of vines in France 

 are placed on this stock with the most 

 satisfactory results. The thi-ee white 

 grapes of this class, from which will 

 )»robably come the best light-coloured 

 wines of America, are- — Faith, very 

 early; Pearl, early; Elviia, medium. 

 Most of tlie hybrids aTid crosses of this 

 class, so faV, are late ; but the reason 

 of this is probably because less atten- 

 tion has been paid to working with the 

 Riparia class than with the Labrusca. 

 If it should become firmly established 

 that the best wines of this continent 

 are to be produced from V. riparia 

 and its seedlings, the ingenuity of the 

 hybridist will soon produce seedlings 

 with as early ripening proclivities as 

 the native Kiparia, which ripens, or 

 rather turns black in August, though 

 ib requires frost to break down its 

 acidity. 



Our native species have been so 

 crossed and mixed amongst themselves, 

 and with V. vinifera, that we have 

 to-day some five hundred and fifty va- 

 rieties of native grapes, which number 

 is rapidly on the increase, though of 

 course many of the least desirable are 

 dropping out of notice, and will in a 

 few years be entirely lost sight of, as 

 better strains are being produceil. 



What this country really wants is 

 early ripening sorts both for table and 

 vviue. The Jeiferson, so highly spoken 

 of in the August number of the Horti- 

 culturist, is, I fear, too late for this 

 part of Canada, ripening after Concord. 

 During the past few weeks, in com- 

 pany with John Lowe, Esq., Secretary 



of the Bureau of Agriculture, the writer 

 liHS been visiting some of the larger 

 vineyards in proximity to the City of 

 Ottawa. The first visited wero those 

 of Mr. Alfred French and Mr. Wm. 

 Graham, of New Edinburgh. The 

 latter is celebrated for the production 

 of the finest clusters of grapes pro- 

 bably on this continent of every va- 

 riety grown there, and also for their 

 early ripening. On one occasion fif- 

 teen varieties were shown at the Exhi- 

 bition at Toronto, and resulted in car- 

 rying off thirteen first prizes and two 

 second. The soil is a black slate or 

 shale, not over i-ich, with a consider- 

 able slope to the south. The dark soil 

 and the southern slope give admirable 

 conditions for early ri[)ening of fruit 

 and wood. ]n point of fact the grapes 

 are generally ten days ahead of any in 

 this vicinity. The mode of training is 

 to erect a trellis on cedar posts four to 

 six inches in diameter, five feet above 

 ground. To tliese are attached two 

 scantling 1| x 3 inches, 1:^ feet long, 

 the lower one a foot from the ground, 

 the other on the top of the posts. To 

 each panel is nailed four liglit upright 

 scantling (round cedar poles slightly 

 flattened at each end were nailed to 

 scantling, two inches thick) ; these 

 will be three feet apart ; the vines are 

 planted in the centre of the panels ; 

 the arms grown the previous year are 

 fastened to the lower scantling ; a cane 

 is tied to each upright pole for bearing 

 fruit, and another of the present year's 

 growth is taken from the base of this, 

 or from the arm, and is tied up for 

 next year's fruiting, when the previous 

 year's cane, which has already fruited, 

 is cut away. So that the .system fol- 

 lowed is the arm renewal plan. The 

 object to be attained is to have new 

 fruiting wood for each year. 



When the Fruit Growers' Associa- 

 tion met here in 1875 some of its otti- 

 cei's visited this vineyard to examine 



