Grapevines( they have not been pruned in years)

Thu Dec 06, 2012 5:06 pm

I am wondering if anyone has any advice on pruning grapevines. At my childhood home, my grandfather had 5 or so grapevines. He always took care of them and passed little information on about how to care for them. I have done a little research and now how to prune a regularly maintained one, but my problem is that they have not been pruned in about 7 years( he was really ill then passed away about 6). Their care has fallen onto me and I don't know where to start due to the fact they have not been cared for in quite some time, plus I don't live there anymore, but I am close enough and free enough to finally have time. I have rudimentary knowledge of the basics of pruning. If anyone has ever had a similar experience, please share.

Thanks

Thu Dec 06, 2012 5:20 pm

Dman - this is a good link for pruning and care of home orchard plants. The varietiy recomendations are not suitable for your region but the planting and pruning guide applies to all regions. You have to adjust your timeing. This is a comprehensive link so you will have to scroll down a bit to get to grape pruning and cultivation.

http://www.lsuagcenter.com/nr/rdonlyres ... ghres2.pdf

Sincerely hope this helps.

Thu Dec 06, 2012 5:35 pm

Thank you. This was a little more informative than the books that I have. I really hope the vines are still good. They are several years older than me, so they may been in their later stages of life.

Thu Dec 06, 2012 6:08 pm

Even very old negected vines can be rejvinated with proper pruning.

Fri Dec 07, 2012 5:30 am

Using these words on a google search: "pictures kniffen grape trellis"

"Kniffen" in this example is a trellis building system.

Fri Dec 07, 2012 10:57 am

BTW - you can use your cuttings to start new vines.

Fri Dec 07, 2012 5:31 pm

tomc wrote:Using these words on a google search: "pictures kniffen grape trellis"

"Kniffen" in this example is a trellis building system.

Thank you!

Thu Jan 10, 2013 1:57 pm

Are they grapes or some kind of muscadine or scuppernong? In GA, muscadines and scuppernongs are much more common.

If muscadines or scuppernongs, I don't know if you can hurt the vines. I had some vines that were grown up onto a large 12x12 trellis that had to be 20 years old. The vines were grown on top of each other and were more than 1 1/2 feet thick on top, just a big mat of interwoven vines. I took a chainsaw and cut the trellis posts off, then cut the 2" vines off about 4 feet above the ground. I then hooked a chain to the trellis and pulled it off the posts and then pulled the remaining post stumps up. When I was done, I had a 2" diameter 4ft tall trunk, completely void of any green growth.

The next spring and summer, it put out a bunch of green vines. The second spring, I picked the longest and healthiest, and built a new trellis for them to grow on. I'm at the end of that second summer and they are starting to look like real vines again, even had a few scuppernongs this summer. I expect a good crop next summer.

I've done this with two different vines, removing 99.999% of the vine and have had great success. If I were you, I'd cut every vine off the main trunk back to two buds. If there are too many vines, say more than every 6 inches, I'd remove the smaller one completely.

Again, I'm not an expert, just know what's worked extremely well for me with two way overgrown vines. Also, you'll want to wait till late winter/very early spring to prune.

The Ison's Nursery web site has lots of info on muscadines and scuppernongs.

-Adrian