122 



CHAPTER XII. 



SUMMER PRUNING. 



Under this heading we will consider all the different operations 

 which have to be executed on the vine itself, from the time it begins 

 to bud in the spring till vintage time. These comprise ordinary- 

 operations, such as disbudding, topping, and tying up, which are 

 practised in most, if not all, of our Victorian vineyards, and some others 

 which might with advantage be executed in special cases, if the 

 augmentation in the crop due to them were sufficient to justify the 

 employment of the extra labour necessary for their execution. Such 

 operations as nipping off the tops of the young shoots, or making an 

 annular incision round them, with the view of preventing the non- 

 setting of the flowers, or stripping off the leaves to afford greater 

 facilities for the ripening of the fruit, come under the latter heading. 



Disbudding, as the name implies, consists in removing all unneces- 

 sary buds as soon as they have burst out into leaf. All shoots having 

 no fruit on them, and which are not necessary to provide wood for the 

 ensuing pruning, should be removed when they are from four to six 

 inches long, or as soon as it can be ascertained with certainty that 

 they bear no fruit, as at this time they can be removed with ease. If 

 they have attained a considerable size before removal, this would 

 entail a waste of energy to the plant, which ought to be avoided. It 

 is also difficult to break them off without wounding to some extent 

 the wood of the vine on which they grow. Sometimes two shoots 

 grow out of the same bud. If this be a bud which was intended to 

 produce a shoot to be utilized at the next dry pruning the weaker 

 one of the two should be removed, otherwise they may both be left, 

 that is, if both show fruit. 



When disbudding, it is important to make provision for replacing 

 arms which, by continual or faulty pruning, have become too long. 

 With this object a few shoots (one or two) ought to be left at the 

 base of such an arm, which may be cut back to one eye at pruning 

 time, as has already been explained (p. 114). 



