Looks like we got about 1/2″ of rain last night and this morning. Most say that new grapevines need about an inch a week during the growing season. Since I am dry farming, rain in moderate amounts is always appreciated!

Well my Cabernet franc is doing relatively well post frost. 75% of the plants have recovered nicely with siginficant shoot growth. The otehr 25% got hit a little harder and they are slow in kicking out new shoots, but progress is being made. No problems with deer yet, but I am spraying Deer Away on the corner plants and end posts.

Last year, with rain approaching and a spray due, I would have waited till after the rain. However, this spring I learned that downey mildew can become a problem a matter of hours once it rains. You want that protectant on the plant when it rains. So I mixed up 4 gallons of dithane and sulfur and gave the plants a thorough drubbing.

Since I don’t have an air blast sprayer, just a simple 15 gallon electric sprayer from tractor Supply, I am spraying on both sides of the rows to assure adequate coverage. My last spray was 10 days ago, and the plants were small enough that I only need about 1.5 gallons to cover a quarter acre. With some plants at 6″ shoot growth or more now, this time it took 4 gallons and I sprayed on both sides of the row.

I am going to try and get buy with this sprayer for this year. It will be a pain and time consuming, but hopefully it will work out ok. Maybe next year, I’ll have a small tractor and will invest in a small sprayer.

This entry was posted on Friday, April 29th, 2005 at 1:15 pm and is filed under Spray Programs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.