362 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER. 



NATIVE GRAPES. 



' Messrs. Editoks : I requested last spring, in 

 your paper, that persons having any new variety of 

 the native grape, would do me the favor to forward 

 me cuttings, that I might test their quality both for 

 the table and for wine. 



The conimunication was extensively republished 

 in most parts of the Union, and the result was, that 

 twenty-four varieties were sent me in February and 

 March last. I grafted them, and also planted cut- 

 tings. Most of the grafts are now in fruit, and from 

 the wood and leaf, about one fourth of them promise 

 to be of superior quality. All of them arcf now in 

 this vicinity but two — the Olmsted and Minor's 

 Seedling. Both of these are Fox grapes. The fruit 

 of the first I have not seen ; the second is the best 

 Fox grape that I have seen. The pulp is unusually 

 soft, for that family, and the grape remarkably sweet, 

 though it docs not contain as niuch saccharine mat- 

 ter as some grapes less sweet to the taste. It is not 

 a great bearer, though it bears uncommonly well for 

 a grape of that class. 



The Fox grape may never be valuable for a wine 

 grape, except to mix with others, to give aroma and 

 flavor. I received cuttings of several varieties of 

 Fox grapes, and the stem and leaf of most of them 

 are so strongly fox, that they cannot be valuable. 

 In my boyhood, I thought this grape the most deli- 

 cious of all fruits, and I found some that bore a fair 

 crop. This vine is easilj' distinguished from all 

 others. The leaf is like leather — thick, and of a 

 white color on the under side, and downy, and the 

 now wood covered with a hairy down, generally of a 

 reddish cast. It is a great objection to it that the 

 fruit drops on *he ground as soon as it is ripe. I 

 rank the common class as about equal to the Black 

 Scuppernong of North Carolina, (the Muscadine of 

 the Mississippi,) from which it appears that a superior 

 wine is made in North Carolina, by putting three 

 pounds of sugar to the gallon, and which sold at four 

 dollars by the gallon ; and from two thousand to 

 three thousand gallons are raised on an acre. Fur- 

 ther, a horticulturist there tells ns he also makes 

 wine from the green grape ; the same person who 

 raises so large a quantity. Mr. Alves, of Kentucky, 

 (formerly of North Carolina.) tells me they put from 

 one fourth to one third of spirits to the gallon, and 

 sell the wine from seventy-five cents to one dollar 

 per gallon : a wide difference in price this. The 

 North Carolina Horticulturist seems learned in the 

 manufacture of foreign wines, as he tells us that one 

 third of brandy is added to p-ort, malmsey, and Ma- 

 deiia wine. This will be news iirdeed to the Euro- 

 pean wine merchants. 



The Black Scuppernong bears from one to four 

 berries on a bunch, and would, in times of war, if 

 lead be scarce, be as valuable, even when fully ripe, 

 as the Fox grape, for bullets. The White Scupper- 

 nong also has a very small bunch, and is a better 

 grape than the Black. But the skin is thick, and 

 the pulp hard : it will never be valuable as a wine 

 grape, unless to give to others must, aroma, and 

 flavor. 



Our vineyards may have produced eight hundred, 

 and probably one thousand gallons on an acre ; but 

 no vineyard has averaged three hundred gallons for 

 ten years. I believe ground with a mixture of sand, 

 or such as will freely let the rains sink, will be less 

 subject to rot, and average double the crop produced, 

 where the subsoil is a stiff claj'. 



I shall be gratified to receive letters from all per- 

 sons having new varieties of hardy grapes in their 

 vicinity, describing the character of the wood and 

 leaf, color, size, and quality of the fruit, &c. After 

 importing foreign grapes for thirty years, from all 

 latitudes, I have never found one worthy of cultiva- 



tion in the open air ; nor do we require tliem. W« 

 have native grapes of superior quality, both for the 

 table and for wine ; and by raising seedlings from 

 our best natives, and from a cross between them and 

 the best foreign, we can greatly improve them. We 

 have neglected our native grapes. 



Forty-five years since, I heard of a superior grape 

 in the garden of Mr. Zane, of Wheeling, found by 

 him in a wild state on Wheeling Island. I sent for 

 cuttings, and found the grape of no value. I heard 

 of a person in Kentucky who had it, and that it 

 proved of good quality. I obtained cuttings, and it 

 proved to be the Vevaj^ or Cape (Schuylkill Musca- 

 del) grape. I am now satisfied that neither was 

 the Zane grape. I, this spring, had cuttings sent 

 me from a vine got of Mr. Zane some thirty years 

 since, and which has never got out of the neighbor- 

 hood, and v.'hich I doubt not will prove of superior 

 ([uality. 



A native grape, of different aroma and flavor, and 

 in all respects equal to the Catawba, would be worth 

 millions of dollars to the nation. If my correspond- 

 ents do not err, some of the kinds sent me are supe- 

 rior. The origin of the Catawba is in doubt. Major 

 Adlum first brought it into notice, having found it, 

 some twenty-five years since, in the garden of a 

 German, near Washington city. 



I received, recently, an interesting letter from Mr. 

 Alves, of Henderson, Kentucky. He was born in 

 North Carolina, and says he heard of the Catawba 

 grape in the upper part of North Cai'olina forty years 

 ago, and that it was discovered near the Catawba 

 River, from which it derived its name. A grape, 

 precisely the same, is said to have been discovered in 

 a wild state, a few years since, in Pennsylvania. I 

 have one from the south-west, of the same color, 

 aroma, and flavor, but smaller, and the vine of slow 

 growth, and a poor bearer ; and one bearing much 

 larger fruit, of precisely the same character, but in- 

 ferior. I discovered it in the centre of my vineyards, 

 and know not how it came there. — N. Loxgworth, 

 m Cincinnati Gazette, 



TO DESTROY BRIERS. 



The brier, as a plant, grows more luxuriantly in 

 beech and maple land ; and when the timber is cleared 

 and the sun has a chance for action, they grow very 

 fast, so that, in a short time, it is with difficulty that 

 they are kept down. In the spring of '-1.5, I moved 

 on a new farm, containing two hundred acres and 

 upwards, with about forty-five acres improved, or 

 partially so. There was at the time eight or ten 

 acres completely grown up to briers. I commenced 

 operations on about half of it ; I ploughed it thor- 

 oughly and planted to corn. By the time the corn 

 was up ready for hoeing, the bri(;rs had completely 

 overrun it. I hoed it and cleared it, and by the 

 second hoeing it was as bad as ever. I then went 

 over it the same way the third time. In fact, the 

 more I hoed and tried to destroy them, the faster 

 they grew ; and by the time of harvesting, they had 

 grown half as high as the corn. The next spring I 

 so^^ ed it to oats, and was poorly paid. At the time 

 of harvesting, my hands were much torn and lacer- 

 ated by the briers, besides not having half a crop. 

 I then concluded to try some more efficient mode, 

 having become tired of endeavoring to subdue them 

 by cutting. I then sowed the ground to clover. The 

 briers came up as usual, but looked sickly. The 

 year following, I pastured it with sheep ; and now 

 the briers have almost become extinct. I have tried 

 every mode in the way of cutting, and I am per- 

 suaded that it is labor lost, • I have tried cutting in 

 the dark of the moon, and in August, all to no pur- 

 pose. I am of the opinion that clover is the best 



