June 21,1894. 
JOURNAL OF HORTICULTURE AND COTTAGE GARDENER. 
487 
RATIONAL METHODS OF 
YINE PRUNING. 
R igid adherence to orthodox rules may easily be carried too far 
in the pruning of Vines. It often has been carried too far in 
the past, crops of Grapes and reputations of men suffering accord¬ 
ingly. True it is that warnings have been given of the imprudence, 
if not the danger, of applying the same system of pruning to all 
Vines under all circumstances. But it is not necessary to travel 
far to observe that they have been in too many instances dis¬ 
regarded, though not in all. For the purpose of impressing a 
truth on many minds, some it may be expected incredulous, and 
others prejudiced, it is necessary to press it home again and 
again. The allusion to incredulity and prejudice does not of 
necessity carry with it a reproach. Both young men and those 
who can no longer be so regarded, yet who are comparatively 
inexperienced in the management of Vines in different varieties 
and various ages, are fully convinced that their method of pruning 
is right, even if the crops of Grapes are the reverse of satis¬ 
factory. They are firm in the belief that this is so because 
they follow strictly the system they have been taught, and which 
proved to the fullest extent successful. Correspondingly, when 
a departure is advocated they are apt to regard it as doubtfully 
Bound, and it is possible the writer who ventures to recom¬ 
mend it may be regarded as something of a faddist. This is, 
perhaps, the natural outcome of inexperience. In saying this, 
again no imputation is conveyed, because a man may have had 
the best of training in the management of the particular Vines 
with which he was connected, but has not had opportunities 
for practising on those essentially differing in character, but 
with which he may be called upon to deal, as many a man has 
been, and failed through his inflexible adherence to orthodox 
methods. 
The more experienced a gardener becomes the less disposed he 
is to change for the sake of change or finding out something new. 
So long as he attains his object, whether it be in Grape growing or 
anything else, he is apt to be content with his routine, and leave 
the field of exploration and discovery to younger men. If he has 
full crops of excellent Grapes from the system of close spur- 
pruning he is wisely content to pursue it ; but if he is a thinker as 
well as a worker, and has acquired some knowledge on vegetable 
physiology, he would quickly depart from that practice when he 
perceived the necessity. It has been perceived and departed from 
with almost magical results in many instances both by the present 
writer and better men—not as a rule, though there are a few 
exceptions, by young men, but generally by those who have reached 
the meridian of life. These are they who can afford to smile 
complacently at the remarks about muddling and such like 
allusions by straight-laced probationers who may think it unpro¬ 
fessional to depart from what they conceive the otly true canons 
of guidance in this work. 
In the pruning of Vines we have to keep clearly in mind the 
object in view—not the object of the pruner so much as that of 
the owner of the Vines. The object of the pruner may be of a 
dual kind. First, he may wish to show his handiwork and give a 
demonstration to his brother gardeners who call on him that he 
knows how Vines should be pruned. Naturally he hopes for 
crops of Grapes such as followed the same system as it was 
applied to other Vines, but they do not come. There is nothing 
No. 730.—VoL. XXVIII., Third Series, 
dual about the owner’s object. It is precise enough. He wants 
the best Grapes the Vines are capable of yielding, and cares 
nothing whatever about the system of pruning. Useless is it to 
explain to him the virtues of close spur-pruning if he has scanty 
crops of fruit. He has regard to the condition of his Vines in 
summer, not in winter. He wants in most cases all the Grapes 
they can be made to bear and properly mature without exhaustion, 
and has the right to have them. Remembering this the gardener 
has to consider the best means to pursue for meeting the case. 
The Vines may be young or not; if they produce short-jointed 
wood and develop and retain good leaves quite to the base of 
the laterals, and the roots are under control, with fibres in 
abundance easily reached, close spur-pruning will do all that is 
needed so far as can be done with the knife in winter. There 
will be enough and to spare of the coveted clusters, and a 
choice can be made of the best formed and most promising 
for the crop ; but there are other Vines, hundreds if not 
thDUsands of them, in various parts of the country in a totally 
different condition, and in consequence of this are not amenable 
to such close pruning, or at least if it is resorted to it 
leads directly and immediately to barrenness rather than pro¬ 
ductiveness. 
Many years ago a young gardener who had been trained by a 
master in the art of Grape growing on the close-spur system of 
pruning was called upon to take charge of Vines, which he per¬ 
ceived, after careful examination, were in a very different state 
from those he had hitherto taken such pride in because of the 
splendid response they gave to the cultural means adopted. The 
latter were not young, but over twenty years old, with rods as 
thick as a man’s wrist and as straight as rods could be. When 
pruned the spurs were mere knobs, not elongated, curled, and 
twisted contortions. They broke freely in the spring, and the- 
laterals were short and rigid; fruit clusters showed often at the 
third and freely at the fourth joint, and the leaves were remark¬ 
able for their persistency close down to the spurs. The border 
was “like a mat” with roots, and these had the best attention.. 
To have pruned those Vines on any other than the system adopted 
would have been something like madness, and if a change had 
been made it would have been the work of a quack and not of a 
genuine gardener. The results proved the method sound, and* 
the object of both master and man was completely attained.. 
What more natural that a pupil trained in such a school- 
should have been prejudiced in favour of the closest of close 
pruning, and that he should have applied it to the much older 
Vines that came under his care during a September in thfv 
fifties, and which were carrying a miserable apology for a crop^ 
of Grapes ? 
He observed they had made growth enough, and were making 
it then, producing long - jointed extensions. He was told they 
always did this towards the end of the season, but made a bad 
start at the beginning. Roots were sought for perseveringly, but 
none could be found except main trunk roots black and fibreless,, 
as if going in the direction of the antipodes. To have followed 
them to their extremities would have been very much a question 
of culvert digging and well sinking. The late growth, as has been- 
said, was rampant, but it was observed that from over a length of 
3 or 4 inches at the base of each lateral the leaves had long since 
vanished, and that the best buds there somewhat resembled small 
bad prickly Spinach seed, those next the spurs being mere specks 
scarcely visible. To such miserable abortions had the Vines 
been pruned, not absolutely close, but an inch or two added 
to the “spurs” yearly. The result was that these had curled* 
into indescribably grotesque shapes, with the least modicum* 
of organised matter stored in them through the absence of' 
leaves. 
The new gardener was clearly told the Vines must remain. 
They had done well for forty years, and he must make the best of 
No. 2386.—VoL. XC., Old Skpies. 
