So as of May 22 the vines are just budding out and are a bit late. Late is not much for our location as over the past 10 years the spectrum for bud break is usually between May 17-23. So we are a bit late but nothing to worry about as some good heat in June and the vines will catch up quick. So the Castel, Foch, Petite Milo have pushed buds furthest. Castel pictured Below;
Bud survival is good on all varieties which is nice as we had a 1 week stretch of about -21 to -23 celcius this past winter and even the Arrow Lakes froze over in parts - so we were not sure what spring would bring. Usually get just 1 day in around the -20 celcius range. The one exception was with the Leon Millot that we experimented with an 50% increased crop load (12 shoots per foot instead of 8 per foot). On these vines the canes died back significantly.
At spring pruning we usually leave extra buds until we know what the bud survival rate is and to ensure we get past a potential late frost. The photo above shows 2 canes bent over onto the trellis for long cane pruning and as you can see virtually all the buds survived and we have now made it past the point of any late spring frost. So we will now get back into the vineyard and shoot thin to the desired crop level for each variety.
Bud survival is good on all varieties which is nice as we had a 1 week stretch of about -21 to -23 celcius this past winter and even the Arrow Lakes froze over in parts - so we were not sure what spring would bring. Usually get just 1 day in around the -20 celcius range. The one exception was with the Leon Millot that we experimented with an 50% increased crop load (12 shoots per foot instead of 8 per foot). On these vines the canes died back significantly.
At spring pruning we usually leave extra buds until we know what the bud survival rate is and to ensure we get past a potential late frost. The photo above shows 2 canes bent over onto the trellis for long cane pruning and as you can see virtually all the buds survived and we have now made it past the point of any late spring frost. So we will now get back into the vineyard and shoot thin to the desired crop level for each variety.
