An Old Technique Revisited.

Pot layering was a technique used by victorian gardeners to produce well sized edible grapes and in quantity on a small plant. It was used primarily in large country houses in order that the master of the house could amaze guests who were able to pick fresh grapes right off the plant. Whole dinner parties were arranged around them and some dining tables had pot sized holes in the center of them to accommodate the grape laden vine in its pot.

It was done by feeding a long shoot still attached to the vine through a hole in the bottom of the pot, filling the pot with soil. The shoot would grow and produce grapes as well as more roots within the pot. When the grapes were ready to be displayed the shoot was severed from the parent vine.

I'm doing the same thing here with one of the arms from the Phoenix vine. The idea here is not to produce grapes but to see if the shoot can root in a pot and grow more vigorously, and therefore come into bearing earlier, than cuttings rooted in the ground.

One problem is that I want the Phoenix to produce a good crop of grapes yet obviously some of its energy will be diverted by the shoot in the pot. Hopefully by the time the grapes are beginning to ripen enough roots will have formed in the pot that it can safely be severed leaving all the vine's strength to ripen the fruit.

We shall see.