We carry out green pruning of grapes in the summer

In regions of traditional viticulture, such as Spain or the south of France, the vine is pruned only in spring and autumn. At the same time, the removal of shoots is aimed at forming a bush, improving and renewing the vine. The further south the growing area, the more sun gets to the berries and the longer the growing season of the plant. The main problem of growing grapes and ripening berries in the middle lane is the lack of heat and light.

Summer helps to partially compensate for the shortness of the Russian summer and create conditions for obtaining the highest quality harvest. pruning grapes... It, in contrast to the spring, does not affect the lignified parts of the vine, but is aimed exclusively at green shoots, foliage and ovaries.

For this reason, summer operations are often referred to as green operations and include chipping and chasing shoots, removing stepchildren, banding, and rationing and thinning the leaves.

How to properly prune grapes before flowering?

After the pruning carried out in the spring, the gardener's attention to the grape bushes should not weaken, since along with the fruit eyes, fatty shoots coming from the old parts of the vine or from the base of the shoots also grow. When and how to prune grapes in summer from unnecessary shoots at this stage? Fragment of grapes is carried out in the last decade of May or early summer, when new green shoots reach a length of 15–20 cm and can be easily removed.

With a competent fragment of shoots on a bush and pruning grapes in summer, you can achieve:

• the presence on each plant of the number of shoots corresponding to the strength of the bush;
• good groundwork for full ripening of shoots and laying a bountiful harvest;
• preserving the harvest from grape diseases and pest attacks;
• access of air and sun to the ovary;
• redirecting food from parasitic shoots to brushes;
• the correct formation of the bush for the next year.

If the tops do not break out in time, they develop due to nutrients, which are extremely necessary for flowering and the formation of the ovary at this time. In addition, fatty shoots shade the bush, prevent air and sunlight from entering the crown, and even prevent the formation of future berries.

At the same time, when pruning grapes in July or earlier, wild shoots growing from the underground part of the bush are removed, but cultivated shoots are left without inflorescences if they are required for the formation of grapes in the future. The stronger the plant, the more shoots are left.

How to prune grapes in the summer from unnecessary shoots

The reserves of nutrients accumulated in the previous season in the roots of the grape bush and the overwintered aerial part, with the onset of spring, are directed to the growth points, including the apical parts of the shoots and inflorescences. If the development of the shoot is extremely active, the future brushes lack nutrients, the flowers begin to crumble, and the inflorescences can turn into antennae.

In order not to lose the harvest, the tops with not yet opened leaves are pinched, which leads to the cessation of the growth of shoots, and the laid inflorescences develop and give an ovary. After watching a video about pruning grapes in the summer for novice gardeners, the intricacies of this process and the compatibility of certain "green operations" become clear. So, for example, the removal of young apical parts of the shoot can be combined with cutting out stepsons or normalizing inflorescences.

The shoot is pinched in the middle of the internode above the first inflorescence. We will also use the technique if it is necessary to regulate the growth of the bush. By pinching the strongest shoots, you can achieve the formation of more inflorescences next year.

How to properly prune grapes before and during flowering?

Removal of the apical parts of the shoots with 5-8 upper opening leaves is called the embossing of the grape bush. Young shoots grow as actively as possible simultaneously with the entry of grapes at the time of flowering and ovary formation. In this case, the growing tip feeds on the leaves that have already opened in the lower part.

Is it possible to prune grapes in the summer when the plant is preparing for flowering, or the ovary is already forming? Yes, shortening shoots with expanding inflorescences will not only not harm the future harvest, but will also help:

• prevent buds shedding;
• get a bountiful harvest on the shoot;
• improve the quality of ripening berries;
• prevent the development of diseases associated with overcrowding, lack of nutrition, light and air.

This technique is most in demand on vigorous varieties, and on grapes with a compact crown and weak growth, where during flowering there is almost no shedding of clusters, such a grape pruning is not performed in summer.

Summer pruning of grape stepsons

For grapes, as for many other crops, the formation of lateral shoots - stepchildren is characteristic.

Removal or shortening of such an increase is necessarily carried out on young, only formed plants, and also doable on already fruiting bushes. At the same time, the operation is more often useful on table grape varieties, and is almost never used on technical grape plantations.

Depending on the number of stepchildren, the chosen method of formation and the strength of the plant, such a pruning of grapes in July is repeated twice or three more times per season and can be combined with chasing or garter vines.

Pruning grapes in July

Is it possible and how to properly prune the grapes after flowering so that the resulting clusters receive more sunlight, are blown by the wind and do not experience a lack of nutrition? It is these goals that the thinning of already formed berries pursues, as well as the removal of part of the leaves during the period when the grapes begin to ripen.

Elimination of 5 to 10 lower leaves on the shoots where the berries ripen allows:

• provide the bush with better ventilation;
• reduce the amount of shadow that interferes with the pouring of the brush;
• drastically reduce the risk of developing gray rot and other grape diseases on berries.

In the cool, short summer of the middle lane, such summer pruning of grapes can be carried out regularly, and in the southern regions, where there is more sun, thinning of the foliage helps in wet years, as well as on strong plants on which ripening is delayed. To obtain the most visible result from the removal of leaves, simultaneously with this operation, on vigorous bushes, grapes are pruned in the summer after flowering, shortening the tops of actively growing shoots.

On table varieties, where it is extremely important to get dense healthy brushes with large berries, they practice the thinning of the ovary.

IN As a result, carried out at a stage when the berries have not yet begun to ripen, sparse brushes are obtained. But more often with sharp scissors, trying not to disturb the berries, they shorten the bunch. In some cases, more than half of the set berries can be removed at this stage, which significantly increases the amount of nutrients supplied to the remaining ovary.

Pruning grapes in summer after flowering

Another technique that helps to get an early high-quality crop is called ringing and consists in removing the bark from the fruit shoot in the form of a thin ring, from 1 to 3 mm thick. In this case, food is redirected to the pouring bunches and those parts of the shoot that were above the cut.

As a result of such pruning of grapes in the summer after flowering, as well as due to improved nutrition, larger grapes can be obtained almost two weeks earlier than without the use of ringing.

However, the operation turns out to be quite painful for the plant and should not be applied annually, so as not to exsanguinate the vine bush and not to drain its root system.

Video about pruning and pinching grapes