The Importance of Pruning Grapes
If you’re growing wine grapes, pruning grapes is a necessary task. It doesn’t matter whether you own a vineyard or your own little backyard vine. The best grapes are those that come from vines that are carefully pruned. Like all plants, they need careful pest control and weeding as well. Often the vines have to receive diligent care for three years before producing good grapes.
Pruning grapes is your method of removing unwanted vine growth and encouraging desirable vine growth so that the grape vines will use their nutrients to produce the strongest possible growth patterns with the best possible grapes. Pruning grapes ensures that the your vines will form in the proper shape in a sturdy, insect and weather resistant form.
It can take years before pruning pays off. But, pruning isn’t the only training your grapevines need. You also need a trellis for your vines to follow to gain the proper form. Make sure each plant is just one strong shoot, tied to the trellis. You should clip off any other shoots.
Eventually, perhaps after a time of little growth, your main shoot should have a couple shoots come out of it. You will want to tie these horizontally along the trellis, as they will develop into the main branches to hold your grape clusters. During each time of slowed growth, you need to be pruning grapes to ensure they grow in the desired directions. This pruning during slowed growth periods must continue indefinitely.
To some extent, pruning grapes should be done according to the grape varieties you grow. For example, some hardier new hybrids have been developed that resist disease and cold weather. They need little pruning because they don’t tend to have extra growths to prune during slowed growth periods. Pruning grapes like this is simply a matter of removing spurs and fruiting canes from the previous harvest. The grapes simply grow a new cane for each grape cluster during each growing season.
Pruning grapes can be a delicate process. If you prune too much, your vine may product extra leaf shoots, which will in turn provide too much shade for your grapes to properly ripen. If you prune too little, your grapes may not grow in desired patterns or on sturdy enough grapevines.
The tools of the experienced grapevine pruner are handsaws, hand pruners, and loppers. Each should be used carefully to cut away unwanted growth, without causing any sort of injury to the plant. For this reason, hand pruners should not be used on shoots of more than a year old. Loppers and handsaws can provide a much cleaner cut on larger shoots, which is important for disease resistance and insect resistance.
Growing good grapes starts with hard work to grow good grapevines. This work must continue for the duration of your grapevines. Fortunately, pruning grapes is one of the easier parts of this process. It is simply a matter of learning how to do proper pruning and taking the time to do the pruning each year. The results will be great grapes.
