Bud Break 2024

 So we have a better picture of how the vines made out through this past winter with the -27c cold snap. With bud break we can really see how they are.

Our Marechal Foch came through fantastic, some die back but overall strong. Leon Millot, sibling vine of Foch, got hit by the cold, probably 50% bud death but its still early to tell. The photo below shows a side by side comparison of Foch row ( fore ground) showing lots of grean leafy buds, and the next row over is Leon Millot with very few buds showing.

The L'Acadie did ok..as predicted the vines located in areas with soil deficientcies got hit hard..really hard with some trunck death. But those vines that entered winter healthy have alot of live buds and look to be very fruitful. Photo below showing buds with 2-3 flower clusters.

Now that danger of frost has passed we are trimming back the vines to a more normal bud count. We will adjust again in June. Phoro below of Foch getting a good hair cut.

Pruning Update: looking good so far

With the deep cold we experienced this past winter...-27c...we were unsure how the vines would be budding out this year, if not trunk damage or how many live buds we would have.

We delayed pruning till we could see whats going on and we are seeing buds push now and while there is damage, in general, things are looking good. Still some time to go to determine if weve lost primary buds and flowers but we will know better by end of May.

For now we can say our commercial varieties look pretty good. We had originally been planning for -25c to -30c lows and chose vines that were supposed to be hardy to those lows.

For Reds...Marechal Foch, Leon Millot, Marquette, GR7 look pretty good so far. Castel is showing the most damage but still not too bad. Foch below;

The L'Acadie and Evangeline look good. Some L'Acadie have damage but thise appear on vines in a few pockets that were stressed due to magnesium deficiency in our sandy soil.  Evangeline is late budding so we still are not 100% sure but again they look good so far as well. L'Acadie below;

So overall things look good so far. Still waiting till they leaf out to confirm primary buds and flowers and get past any late season frosts but if all else is normal we should have a fairly normal crop too. Of interest is the other  non-commercial vines we have that are showing well with low apparent damage and pushing buds after the nasty cold snap.

Reds: Triompe D'Alsace, Colmar Precose Noir, Lucy Kuhlman, St. Croix, Marechal Joffre...all looking good.

Whites: Petite Milo, Vandal Cliche, Ravat 34...also all looking good.