KEEPING GRAPES. How to Enjoy Fresh Fruit in the Winter.

Te Aroha News, Volume VI, Issue 348, 6 March 1889, Page 4

KEEPING GRAPES. How to Enjoy Fresh Fruit in the Winter.

The mere fact that in grape culture, whether eai-ly or late, the productions of the home grower cannot in any way be equalled by any sample from abroad is sufiicient to ?how the necessity of keeping them in good condition as late in the season as possible, inasmuch as late grapes from December till May meet a ready sale, oftentimes at very high prices. In this country very little attention has been paid, to the utilisation and preservation of late fi uib, and we hope that such an important point will receive more attention in the future than it has in the past. In every other country but our own this always forms an important feature in fruit culture for profit, and is always attended with very satisfactory results. With home-grown grapes and with the late productions of the hob-house, especially, the first thing 1 to observe is bhab the grapes retain as much bloom as possible, and that each bunch is kept intact, and is prevented from coming in contacb with anything that would rub the berries and disfigure them. Various well-known methods have been tried and are still in use, but the two following simple and effective systems may be utilised to great advantage, whether the grapes be grown for pleasure or profit, inasmuch as they both admit of the free circulation of an even temperature equally around each bunch, and prevent the same from rubbing against each other. In fact, among the many methods for keeping grapes in their natural state tor use in winter there will none bo found better than the simple ones hore described. The first method is to take new soap oxes, or any other boxes of about; that size, and nail cleats on the inside of the ends or sides about one inch from the top, and between them bars ab various distances, as required by the varying lengbh of the bearing shoot cuttings. The bars are made by nailing a small strip on top of each. As *at« as possible- cub off the bearing shoots

containing the bunches with pruning shears, and shorten them so that they will go between the end of the box and the top part of the bar, resting on the bottom part, thus hanging tho bunches in their natural position. By this method the boxes can be handled without shaking the shoots off the bars, carried bo the light, each bunch examined as winter advances, decaying ben ies or bunches removed, and the best kept without any mouldy taste, which is so common when they aro packed solid. Another \ery simple and inexpensive plan will be found to answer admirably. All that is required are two or more iron or wooden hoops, two lengths of wire to every two hoops to hold them in position, and some string, and the contrivance is complete. When hung up ib is the easiest thing in the world to trim out decayed or useless berries ; in fact, the stock of grapes can be kopfc in good condition without even shifting the contrivance at all. At a recent horticultural meeting at Orimsby a member gave an account of his mode of preserving grapes till midwinter. He filled cheese boxes with them and buried the boxes in earth so as to totally exclude the air. He then kept them till February. There is no doubt that the chief merit of this mode was in giving the grapes a cool temperature, excluding air currents and preserving the coolness unchanged. If the same conditions could be pieservod in a fruit-room they would be kept equally well ; but in common practice they are more or less exposed to air or air curients, and to a changing degree of temperature. For burying them the soil should be compact, free from stone and with a perfect drainage. But, of course, this is not simple nor, in fact, so effectual as the two methods suggested above.