Flexibility Training.

You may be asking yourself why the vines are being trained the way they are. Particularly the four arm training system when almost everything you read about grape training speaks of  one or two arms. The answer is flexibility. Also many of these texts are for open vineyards but I'm talking about home production.

Unfortunately in Britain the weather at flowering time cannot always be relied on. Yet it is the most crucial time for berry set and deciding potential harvest. No fruit set equals no grapes that year.

About one year in every three we have a wet cool period when the vines are in flower resulting in poor berry set and therefore a reduced harvest. Think of all those wet Wimbeldon fortnights and you get the idea. Grapes like warm sunny weather during flowering.

Some varieties, Madeleine Angevine and Chardonnay for example, are better at setting grapes in damp, cool weather. But many will only set a much reduced number of grapes in such conditions.

So by allowing more buds to form shoots you increase the chance of regulating the crop according to the season. In a good year with a high fruit set bunches can be cut off so only the planned number remain. In a bad year when the bunches are only one third or half set you have more bunches left that could produce almost the same planned yield.

This is good for you and for the vine since  a poor crop load unually results in over vigorous shoot growth.

Leaving more shoots also means more canopy of course. Grape vines in this country need more foliage to ripen the grapes. But foliage should not impede the grapes so a canopy management system should be thought about. I will talk about this later when the vines are in active growth but it really isn't too difficult.