Last spring we had the 100 yr frost in this region. All orchard fruit
was lost as far south as Birmingham and scattered below there. We had
two days of mid 20s after a week of mid 80s. All my vines were setting
flowers at the time. Most of the vines had split or had other trunk
damage and it was suggested that I cut any that had trunk damage back
since they were young and the damage would limit future productivity.

I don't expect to ever see similar conditions and the varieties I have
are supposedly suitable for the region. It would seem to me that it
might help the vines to recover if I left more buds than would be a
normal balanced pruning and then did severe cluster thinning very early,
maybe leaving a cluster or two per vine to see how the clusters develop,
that the additional leaf area would add additional food to the vine and
therefore help it catch up. I just want to make sure that I'm doing
nothing stupid. Does it sound reasonable or will I get too much vine
vigor and the vine go crazy?

Paul, I have spurs/canes from last years growth with new buds sprouting.

Dick



AxisOfBeagles wrote:
> I think Paul asks a good question - where you live and what you're
> growing. Also, what pruning / trellising structure are you using? VSP?
>
> I'm in the Sierra Foothills in Nor Cal, growing a number of varieties,
> about 200 vines total. Right about now, each year, frost is my biggest
> worry. I'm not sure why you pruned back to the ground - were the vines
> so severely frost bitten that the trunk and crodons were dead wood?
> That's a hellacious cold frost. When I get hit hard by frost, as I did
> three yeas ago, I end up simply pruning as per normal, although I
> sometimes lose spurs if no canes grew in any given spot. But usually
> there is a second emergence most everywhere - even if not fruit bearing.
>
> IMHO, I would not try to push more canes than 'normal'. It turns into a
> canopy management nightmare. Worse, it screws up your spur patterns for
> the following year. Glad to hear that you're dropping fruit still in the
> 2nd & 3rd year. Let those vine roots establish first - many growers take
> fruit in the 3rd year, but waiting to 4th year seems to me to produce
> stronger vines (I've done both).
>
> Speaking of frost - all vines but the Cab are now broken bud, and this
> next few weeks is my "worry window". Light frost on the ground today -
> nothing to worry about. But this clear cold weather is worrisome now
> that the new leaves and canes are pushing out. My May 1st the frost
> danger will be past, but I've been hit as late as April 19 in years
> past. One of these days will get a sprinkler system out there.
>
> Good luck!
>
>
>
> On 2008-04-06 18:10:45 -0700, Dick Heckman > said:
>
>> I have some vines that were hit hard by last year's Easter frost. I
>> had to take many back to the ground. So I now have a mix of 2 and 3
>> year old vines. Since I'll nip off almost all of the clusters, would
>> it be better to allow some more buds than the average recommended buds
>> per vine to get a few more leaves out for more nutrients for the vine
>> or go with the data for a producing vine? This applies mostly to the
>> 3 yr vines. I'm not going to let them go wild but I'd like to build
>> them up as much as possible.
>>
>> Dick
>
>