My grape

Back in my country I have seen many houses with a little wooden deck that oversights the garden and has a grapevine growing along the pergola. I, of course, have always wanted to have a house like that.

Pione grapes from japan

Now I live in japan, in a small apartment on the tenth floor. It's very different from my dream house. But that doesn't mean I can't have a grapevine in my garden.

I learned something very important about growing grapevines from my grandfather. Grapevines can thrive on containers. He used to have one growing on a little bucket on his roof garden, and he had it fruiting many years.

My grandfather past away some years ago, but I always maintain the memory of him working on his garden smiling and offering me some fruits (he grew so many things, including some very delicious strawberries which also inspired me for my garden). So in his memory I wanted to have some grape and I wanted to do it well. I researched on how to grow grapes and set my path to the garden center. There I found it hard to decide which kind to choose and had trouble with japanese kanji, so I wrote down some names and headed back to the internet to look up the Japanese names.

I learned a lot, about grapes, how to grow them, how they grow them in japan, and all the different species.

At the end I decided to set for a pione it is a crossbreed between a Kyoho (a Japanese type) and some other. This kind of grapes are very sweet, very big and have no seeds. Here I have seen they sell them at the luxury fruit food stores. So I think they must be very good, I hope mines can reach that hi-quality.

Also here in japan I had visited some grape farms, they have a very peculiar way of taking care of them wrapping them on a paper bag while on the vine to protect them. I want to try their method with mines.

I visited this pione grape farm last year

I got my plant this august as only one branch so I have to wait for next season to see if I can get some fruit, but I am very hopeful. From the moment I set the plant on its pot it started growing roots like crazy, some of them even reached the edges of the pot and overflown a little, and it is the biggest pot on my garden. I think that with such a nice start it will have a lot of strength for next year. Let's see how it goes.