Vitis californica (cont.) 
Cluster: Fertile,— small 3" to 4" or more long; shouldered heavily, 
similar to many V. vulpina; compact; peduncle very short; rachis usually simple 
or little compounded, thinly cottony; clear reddish-violet; pedicels 4" or less 
long, rather thick, enlarging rapidly toward the receptacle, warty. 
Flowers: As I have never been able to grow the species here to bearing 
age, owing to sensitiveness to cold and mildew, I have not been able to study the 
flower sufficiently to give an exact description more than that they are much 
as in V. arizonica and in V. cinerea, very small and delicate. 
Berries: 1/3" to 4" in diameter, round or little oblate, black, with 
heavy prunose bloom; persistent; skin rather thick, pulp seedy with little juice, 
very sugary and pleasantly flavored. 
Seeds: 2 to 4, mostly 3, large 1/5" to +" long by 1/6" to 1/5" broad, 
obovate, of a light brown burnt coffee color, dull, not shining; beak large, short 
and blunt; raphe large ominen ing ov he rounded end of the seed and 
distinct down to base of beak; chalaza long-ovate, prominent, frequently salient 
above the surface of seed, flat or convex, surrounded by a shallow groove; ventral 
depressions short, shallow, about parallel with raphe, rather wide apart. 

Plantlet: Seed-leaves medium to large, ovate or cordate, pale green with 
short petioles. 

Natively it is found along streams, also on hillsides, along dry ravines, ete.,| 
in Middle and Norther Californie, especially in the Sacramento Valley and in the 
Rogue River Valley in Southwestern Oregon. 
—-.~ Foundations of American Grape Culture, by T. V. Munson, 1909. 

