The leaves are changing, the air is getting cooler, and the days are shorter. It must be fall! Fall is a great time to get out in your yard and take care of some gardening tasks before winter comes. There are many jobs that you might have to do in order to ensure your garden looks great to come springtime when everything is blooming again. We’ve created this checklist of fall gardening tasks so that you can stay on top of all the things that need tending to in these final months before cold weather sets in for good!
Feeding grapes in the spring is essential because when planted in well fertilized holes, seedlings have enough nutrition for two to three years, after which the soil must be enriched. Consider the most effective chemical fertilizers, as well as the best folk remedies to help grow and harvest a great crop.
Grapes need basic fertilizers, which are applied once every few years, and additional fertilizers, applied annually in the spring and fall.
Necessity and timing of grape fertilization in spring
Every year, giving the harvest, grapes take nutrients from the soil, without which they will not be able to develop normally and bear fruit in the future. With a lack of necessary substances, the bush becomes vulnerable to diseases and pests, the vine ripens poorly, the ovaries fall off.
Additional fertilizers are applied in spring according to the scheme, focusing on the stage of grape development:
The first is when the bush is dormant (mid-April);
The second – two weeks before the beginning of flowering, when the brush buds have just appeared (mid-May);
Third – after fruit setting (end of May – beginning of June).
The main elements that grapes need are nitrogen for vine and leaf growth, phosphorus for flowering and ripening, and potassium for active setting and increasing plant immunity. Grapes also need: copper, magnesium, zinc, sulfur, boron, iron.
Lack of one or another element can be determined by the condition of the leaves of grapes and adjust the composition of nutrient solutions. The following symptoms of deficiency occur:
nitrogen – leaves are light green, vine growth is stunted;
Potassium – brown leaf margin;
phosphorus – dark green leaves with brown spots, delayed flowering;
iron – yellowing of leaf plate, but veins remain green;
sulfur – vine growth points die off.
As fertilizers for grapes in the spring you can make organic, one-component and complex fertilizers, as well as use folk recipes nutrient solutions.
How to fertilize grapes in spring
Fertilizing grapes should be applied at the level of the main roots – this is one of the basic rules of feeding the vines. In this way, the nutrients will be fully absorbed, and will work to the benefit of the bush. Superficial feedings stimulate the growth of additional roots, which can lead to slower grape development.
Ways to apply top dressing
When planting a seedling, experienced grape growers recommend digging a pipe through which you can later water and feed the grapes. Asbestos or plastic pipes with a diameter of 10-12 cm are used. They are placed at a distance of 50-80 cm from the nursling (depending on the growth strength of the variety) and deepen at least 40 cm.
There is another way to properly feed grapes. At a distance of 50-80 cm from the bush, a trench 40-50 cm deep should be dug along the entire diameter. Nourishing solutions are poured into this trench, and then it is covered with earth.
It is important to remember that before each feeding, the grapes should be abundantly watered.
Chemical solutions for spring feeding
Basic for spring feeding of grapes is a solution of two tablespoons of superphosphate, one tablespoon of ammonium nitrate and a teaspoon of potassium sulfate. All components are dissolved in 10 liters of not cold (20-25 degrees Celsius) water. This amount of solution is consumed per grape bush, pouring it into a pipe or groove.
The first and second feeding of grapes in spring is carried out with the solution described above. Ammonium nitrate should be excluded from the composition of the third feeding – nitrogen at this stage of development can cause an increased growth of green mass to the detriment of bunches formation.
To feed grape bushes in the spring, you can use npk fertilizers . The preparations are dissolved in water according to the instructions and applied to the soil in the way described above.
Using organics for spring fertilization
Grapes respond well to the introduction of organic fertilizers in the soil. Organics can be used as the main fertilizer, and in combination with mineral fertilizers. Remember that organic fertilizers can be applied only before flowering.
The decomposed manure is brought under the bush in early spring, and embedded in the soil to a depth of 25-30 cm. It improves soil structure, promotes the development of microflora, saturates the plant with nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Manure can be replaced with compost made from grass clippings, ashes, sawdust, and vegetable waste.
Slurry can be used for liquid fertilization in the spring. Pour one part of the manure in two parts of water in a barrel, and insist 10 days. The fermented solution is diluted with water one to six and poured into the hole around the bole at the rate of 10 liters per bush.
Chicken droppings are effective as a fertilizer. Use it in the form of a liquid infusion. To prepare a liter of dry manure pour water (4 liters) and leave to ferment for two weeks. Immediately before application, the slurry is diluted with water, bringing the volume to 10 liters. For each bush, 0.5-1 liters of solution are used.
You can fully compensate the need of grapes in potassium with ash from the husk of sunflowers. For root dressing prepare an extract of ash – two liters of the substance pour 8 liters of water and insist a day, stirring occasionally. A liter of ready extract is diluted with a bucket of water and applied under each bush.
Off-feeding of grapes in spring
The foliar feeding of grapes complements the root feeding, but does not replace it. Grape leaves quickly assimilate micro and macro nutrients dissolved in water. Solution for spraying is prepared from the same components as for root dressing: urea or ammonium nitrate, superphosphate, potassium sulfate, with the addition of trace elements – zinc, boron, copper, etc. Before use, 50 g of sugar is added to the nutrient composition to slow its evaporation from the leaves.
You can use solutions of complex fertilizers: Master, Florovit, Biopon – they are sold at any garden store. The dosage of preparations for foliar feeding is specified in the instructions.
From folk recipes for foliar feeding of grapes popular herbal infusion with the addition of ash extraction. To make it you need a barrel half full of grass clippings, pour water to the top, and leave to ferment for 10-14 days. For spraying, add a liter of fermented infusion and 0.5 liters of ash extract to a bucket of water.
The first spraying is carried out before the appearance of flower buds (in early May), the second – after flowering (in early June). The treatment is carried out in the evening or morning hours, when there is no aggressive sunlight. To prolong the effect of the solution, every day the vine bushes are irrigated with clean water. Dried solution thus becomes liquid again and is well assimilated by the plant.
Summary
In order to maximize the return of the vine bush, it is necessary to apply fertilizers according to the schedule, adhering to the recommended doses. You can use chemical preparations or resort to folk recipes – the choice is yours. The main thing is to provide the grapes with sufficient nutrition for growth and abundant fruiting.
So our objective today is to cut off last seasons growth to keep the structure of the vine in a manageable form.
We are going to cut off 90% of what grew last year and leave two canes to lay down for next years growth.
So we’ve got our vine.
This is a bilateral vertical shoot position trellis, meaning that it’s a vertical shoot as you can see the rows are tucked in to the wires.
Bilateral meaning we have two arms, some vineyards nowadays are getting planted at a closer spacing and they will sometimes only have one arm.
So we have our trunk, let’s see if this works better.
This will be our trellis wire.
These are shoots that grew last year.
When I come to a vine to prune it, the first thing I look for is which canes I want to keep.
Which are the ones that I want to lay down.
So let’s say I pick this one and this one.
Everything else is going to get cut off and pulled out of the trellis and laid in the row to be chopped later.
So we’ll make a cut here and here.
And then you can also, to pull the brush out, because they’re in the wires they get tangled up in there and it can be kind of a pain.
I find that the more times you cut it the easier it is to pull it out.
So I’ll pull and if it doesn’t come out, I’ll cut it.
If it still doesn’t come out, I’ll cut somewhere else.
I basically will just keep cutting until it comes out with one arm.
I don’t want to see anybody doing this and yanking it out.
You might wack your neighbor, you might throw your back out, it’s easier, believe me, just to cut it the tendrils and stuff will get wound up in the wires, and I’ll show you when we get out there.
So we have the head area here, this is where we want our canes that we keep to originate from, to keep the form.
If we picked one of these canes down here to lay down, we have this area that’s not being utilized.
We want to fill, the objective is to fill the linear footage of the wire so that there’s a bud every four inches in an ideal world.
That doesn’t happen but, if we lay this one down here we have this are where there’s potentially no buds and we are not using it.
The form of the vine just gets out of control if it gets pruned poorly year. after year.
Three good canes, we’ll put another one here, we want to leave three good canes, get rid of everything else.
I tend to clean them up a little bit, meaning cut off tendrils or lateral shoots so it’s just a nice clean cane.
Then I’ll tip it usually right before the top wire just to make it easier to wrap later.
Good wood is critical.
We always want to lay down a good cane, that is going to be our fruit for the next year.
If we lay down a good cane that has good viable buds in it, we have a good crop next year.
If we lay down a weak cane that’s skinny, it might not be able to support the growth, the vascular tissue might not be enough to support that many mouths to feed.
The clusters are sinks.
We also don’t want bowl canes, bowl cane is one that is really big in diameter.
They’re usually from second year growth.
A latent bud that had pushed the year before for some reason.
That’s something like as big around as your thumb.
The reason we don’t want those is because the internodes are going to be like a foot.
And we don’t want that.
Perfect internode length is three to five per foot.
So four per foot is ideal.
Where your canes originate from is important.
We want them to originate from the head, but we also want them to be able to be laid down meaning they need to bend at a 90 degree angle to lay down on this wire.
After pruning, these guys will get tied to the fruiting wire and if they’re above that fruiting wire, the angle doesn’t work.
You are gonna try and bend it down and it’s going to break off.
One fist in Spanish, one puño.
We want one puño between shoots and also below, we want our shoots to originate from about that distant below the fruiting wire.
That gives us enough room to bend it onto the fruiting wire.
