110 THE GRAPE CULTURIST. 



serves an important purpose in assisting it to climb ; in 

 the cultivated vine, it being artificially supported, tendrils 

 are no longer needed, and may be cut off while young, as 

 they are not only useless, but will, if allowed to remain, 

 often cause the vine to become entangled, and produce 

 confusion where order is necessary. Fig. 35 -f shows a 

 portion of a vine with tendril (A) attached, the end of the 

 tendril in two divisions, one considerably shorter than the 

 other ; both of these, possess much interest when, instead 

 of being tendrils, they are bunches of fruit. 



The first three or four tendrils produced in spring upon 

 bearing vines are but the peduncles or flower-stalks of the 

 thyrse of flowers, which eventually becomes a bunch of 

 grapes. But if the elements requisite to support the flow- 

 ers and fruit are not supplied, or by accident the proper 

 amount of light and heat is excluded, then these pe- 

 duncles will become tendrils. Therefore a tendril may 

 be said to be a barren peduncle, and a bunch of fruit a 

 productive tendril, for they may become either under favor- 

 able circumstances. The divisions of the tendril referred 

 to above show a peculiar characteristic in the formation 

 of the bunch of fruit, which is seen in most of our native 

 as well as in many of the European varieties of grapes. 

 The longer division becomes the main body of the bunch, 

 and the shorter becomes what is termed the shoulder. 

 Fig. 36 shows a bunch of grapes as produced from a di- 

 vided productive tendril. This form of bunch might be 

 appropriately called the natural form, and certainly it seems 

 to carry with it more of the general idea of a bunch of 

 grapes than many of the other forms which are occasionally 

 seen. 



Sometimes a bunch is divided into several small clusters 

 which partly or entirely surround the main body ; when 

 this occurs they are called clustered bunches instead of 

 shouldered. But as the bunches of fruit are more or less 

 variable in the same kind of grape, it is not expected, in 



