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Hardy Seedless Table Grapes
 

Overview:

Grapes need a relatively warm Summer and a dry, warm Fall to be really successful. You must be careful selecting your varieties to avoid problems with:

a.) poor ripening due to insufficient summer heat,

b.)diseases, especially powdery mildew (some varieties are real prone to this during wet Springs & Summers), and

c.) winter damage when temperatures fall below about -10F.

Most acceptible short-season, backyard varieties have been produced over the past 15 years or so out of the breeding programs in New York and other non-Southwestern states. Many of the varieties you are offered in catalogs are edible, but not all are worth growing. Some have good, sweet flavor, but they don't tell you that the skins are tough and the interior soft and watery. Try the grape, or at least talk to someone who has eaten it, or consider the grape a test that will take 3 - 5 years to fruit properly.

So far, my favorite varieties are:

grape

1. Suffolk Red, a hard to find variety out of New York's grape breeding program. This variety is very hardy, productive, and appreciated by all who test the fruit. The fruit is sweet and flavorful, with a melting, soft texture, not crisp. It is a pleasant eating experience, but the cluster break apart fairly easily, and the fruit crushes and cracks when piled up, so trasport to markets would be difficult. This one is a long-term back yard winner.

2. Black Monukka, though it is hurt by temperatures that go below -10F, it recovers well and is well worth keeping due to it's very high fruit quality. It is truly one of the best home garden grape varieties for warmer summer areas of Eastern Washington.

3. Interlaken, though an old variety, it is very hardy, productive, and flavorful, and I can't bring myself to take it out. It is still superior to many of the new tough-skinned "seedless" varieties you find in catalogs. (Picture of Interlaken).

4. Glenora is very good. People who taste the fruit like it, saying it tastes "like blueberries." It is sweet, crisp, seedless and flavorful. It is my favorite home garden grape. (Picture of Glenora).

Grape varieties I have pulled after testing: Thompson Seedless, Muscat, Canadice, Himrod, Saturn, Tokay, Vanessa and several others that failed the edibility or disease resistance test. I have pulled Perlette and Flame due to their all-too-common winter damage. These are quite good if you live where summers are hot and winters are mild, but we're not talking about California here.

 

Birds:

If you grow grapes, expect birds to love them even more than you do. If you have limited production, you may try wrapping each ripening cluster in an inverted cone of doubled up newspaper, held together by masking tape. My birds got wise to this and started tearing through the paper to get the grapes. Putting a net over the entire grapevine has helped a lot. Purchase netting from a wholesaler, who may sell you a very large roll of wide netting. All the net you will ever need to protect your cherries, strawberries, grapes, etc. will cost very much less than if purchased 10 x 20 feet at a time from a gardening supply store.

PEARS - STONE FRUITS - APPLES - IRRIGATION


A GRAPE SITE: