
          Culture of the Vine.

Valuable practical information on the culture
of the Vine, from the author of “ Coxe on Fruit
Trees.”

BURLINGTON, July 22, 1828.

J. S. Skinner, esq.—

Sir—The cultivation of the vine has
become so important to the health, morals,
and prosperity of our country, that I
cheerfully comply with the wishes of respectable 
friends, by communicating to
you the result of numerous experiments,
made under my own observation, in engrafting 
various kinds of delicate foreign
grapes and superior varieties of our domestic 
grapes on the more vigorous stocks
of cultivated vines, or on the native vines
of our fields, or transplanted native vines,
removed from our hedge rows into our
gardens at the moment of engrafting. The
process is extremely simple, and as far as
I can learn from inspection of the most
improved English and French writers,
and from inquiry of intelligent foreigners, 
is not. practised in Europe. It is
performed by inserting a scion, of the
usual size for planting, in the root or
stock, under the surface of the earth, covering 
it with the earth, raised round the
stock high enough to protect the scion
which is about six inches long, with two
eyes only, the upper one to be even with
the top of the little hillock raised around
the plant. No clay or composition is
necessary. The stock must be at least
one inch in diameter, at one or two inches
above the crown of the plant, when bared
to the first roots, It must be sawed off at
that point. The stock is to be carefully
split, after the loose bark is scraped off,
and if necessary, opened by a wedge ; the
scion, when firmly fixed, will be retained
in its place by the pressure of the stock,
after the wedge has been withdrawn or
cut off. The time for engrafting is the
same as for the apple—about the 1st to
the 10th of April in this state. In two
or three weeks the buds will sprout. One
only must be permitted to grow ; it must
be trained to a stake, and kept pruned of
latteral shoots. In a good soil, it will
grow ten or twelve feet the first year ; after 
this, it may be cut down to two or
three eyes, or trained at greater length to
a trelliss, according to its strength. They
invariably bear fruit the second year, and
frequently will produce one or more
bunches the first year. This, however,
should not be permitted, except from a
wish to ascertain the quality of the fruit.
It is now about six years since the first
attempt of an intelligent neighbor in this
mode of engrafting was exhibited to me,
after repeated failures of the ordinary
mode of engrafting above the surface,
with the aid of clay and composition. I
had experienced similar failures in my
own experiments, owing, I presume, to
the greater flow of sap in our climate. I
have now growths of at least ten feet
from grafts of this spring, exhibiting a
luxuriant growth of a single bunch of
grapes. When the stock is sufficiently
large, two scions may be inserted, and
if successful, may be reduced to a single
stock, or one of them may be laid down
by training, about six inches under the
surface, to form another vine, which in
the second year will be nearly equal in
strength and productiveness to the parent
vine. From the facility with which this
operation may be performe, and the
short interruption it creates in the bearing, 
it will be easy to change any number
of vines from unproductive and inferior
kinds, to such as may be adapted to the
soil, climate and object of the cultivator.
Foreign and tender kinds may be speedily 
acclimated, and an early diffusion of
the finer kinds, through our extensive
country may be accomplished, wherever
native stocks are to be found.

I believe this mode of engrafting will
be new to the greater portion of your
readers, it certainly is unnoticed by the
Abbe Rosier, by La Nouveile, Quintinye,
by Miller and Forsyth, all of whom I have
consulted—and a highly intelligent
friend, a native of France, possessing
large estates in that country and in the
United States, assured me after careful
inspection of my vines, that it was perfectly 
new to him, and would encourage
him to introduce it in his extensive plans
of improvement, to which he is devoting
much of his ample means.

I am, respectfully and truly.
Your friend and obed’t [obedient] serv't [servant].

WM. COXE

        