What Grape am I growing

[mhandel]

I moved into a house with grapes already growing in the back yard. The owner said he knows they are wine grapes but not sure what kind. Does anyone think they know what grape this is so I know the best time to harvest???

 

[GreginND]

Hard to tell from green grapes. Show us when they are ripe and there may be a small chance someone could identify them. Where do you live? Climate and location may give one clue.

 

[mhandel]

I live in Pennsylvania

 

[grapeman]

Pretty poor picture to tell anything from. It looks like the lower side of the grapes is a very light, whitish looking color which can indicate one of the American varieties of grapes, possibly Concord. The clusters look like them, but I agree, green grapes are hard to even guess with. When they ripen, taste them and that could be a clue.

 

[JohnT]

Judging from the size of the berries, I think you can rule out most european varialtals (Cab sav, merlot, chardonnay, etc). They look more like the size that most table grapes take on (although there are a few varitals that take the form of larger berries). Larger berries tend to produce a lower sugar % and are more and more suited to be consumed as fruit.

This is not to say you can't make wine out of them. I know plenty of folks that make grat wines out of both thompson's or Muscat. Still, it is hard to tell via the picture.

 

[jswordy]

Sammyk here told me this and my herbalist wife confirmed it. If you will take a cluster of the grapes and a sample of the leaves (just clip off a runner with all) to your local extension office, they will use a "key" by which they will likely be able to determine the variety for you.

My wife said the key contains all kinds of intricate info like how the veins look on the backs of the leaves, are the veins or leaf backs hairy, color info, cluster size, stem size, etc., etc.

Might be worth a shot.

 

[mhandel]

Guess thats what ill have to do. Its about 30 minutes away. Might as well bring some soil with me as well for the rest of the garden.