HOW TO TAKE CUTTINGS FROM GRAPEVINES |The Garden of Eaden

For many of gardeners, growing grapes vines in the garden is usually no more than a misplaced romantic idea of producing your own wine. Whereas it is far more realistic to look at it as a concerted attempt at fruit production.

How to take cuttings of grapevines

However, the history of grape production and human kind has been entwined for thousands of years, and - to be fair - it's not a bad ornamental plant in its own right. So whatever your reasons for growing, you will get some benefit.

Unfortunately, vines can be expensive to purchase and you may not be able to find the varieties you want, but as it turns out, grape vines are very easy to propagate from cuttings.

Be aware though that modern wine production involves grafting cultivated varieties onto rootstocks resistant to the phylloxera aphid - a major pest of commercial grapevines worldwide.

How to propagate vines from hardwood cuttings

Cutting material

To begin with, prepare a small pot for rooting the cutting by filling with equal amounts of sand, peat and perlite. You can also use fine gravel for rooting your cuttings.

If you wish to use rooting hormones, pour an inch of rooting hormone into a plastic cup and set it aside. However, vines are so easy to root, it really isn't worth the effort or cost of purchasing hormone powder.

Cut 4 to 8 inch long sections of hardwood stems from the vines you wish to propagate. Use a sharp, sterile scissors and measure from the stem tip. Make sure that the uppermost cut is sloping.

The recommended time to take hardwood cuttings is anywhere between November and February.

Remove all the lateral shoots and any dormant buds from the lower half of each cutting. Insert a pencil at a depth of about 2 to 3 inches in the rooting medium to create planting holes.

At this point - should you wish to - dip the base of each cutting into the rooting hormone and plant immediately in individual planting holes.