Have some Grapevines in your backyard? Well it’s time to start thinking about pruning them back. Pruning season can always be a little tricky to time right, especially if you a have a few thousand of them. Whew. The window between steady cold temps and a warming spring can be short when you have weather events as we have recently in Tennessee. With January days hitting record highs of 75, you can easily lose the entire plant if you have pruned before a warming day such as this and the sap creeps up, leaks from the cuts you have made like a maple tree spout full force. Then lo and behold the weather turns cold. The formerly running sap freezes in the veins of the grapevine and oila, a shattering…freeze damage and possible death. Don’t freak out. Just look at your 10 day forecast and plan your time accordingly. Here are some rules of thumb Vinifera: European vines are more susceptible to everything including unstable temperature changes, even when dormant. Try to prune these closer to budding season, but make sure you get it done before bud break!Hybrid grapevines: These are typically bred for unpredictable east coast weather and climates. However, they don’t like single digits temps unless they have had a good many days of cooling before it hits. We normally start pruning these guys by mid January.Native vines:These are your Catawbas, Muscadines, Concords and more! Of these, the southern most variety, muscadine virus rotundifolia, can be pruned later in the season here in Tennessee because they bud out later being more native to southern states. We start after all of the other vineyards are pruned, by end of March. As for Concords (northern native) and the others, start them by mid January. Hope this helps my grape-growing friends out there! give us a shout out if you have any pressing grapevine questions.
