Crystal Grape

Grape Kristall is a frost-resistant variety created by Hungarian breeders. Refers to technical, but tasty, sweet and not inferior in quality to table varieties.

Characteristics and description of the variety

The variety is obtained by crossing Amurskiy, Challotsi Lajos and Villars Blanc varieties.

Early maturing. It takes only about 116 days from growing season to ripening. Withstands frosts up to 30 degrees. In regions with milder winters, it can be grown uncovered.

Bunches are medium, conical in shape, weighing up to 210 g, in warm places up to 400 g. Berries are small in size, shape - oval, yellow-green color with a waxy coating, yellowish-white. The fruits are juicy and sweet, covered with a thin firm skin. Sugar content 17 - 19 brix. Acidity 6-7 g per liter.

Crystal bushes of medium height with medium-sized dark green leaves. Leaves of various shapes grow on one bush, strongly dissected, slightly dissected and moderately dissected.

The berries are well preserved on the vine, so you can take your time with the harvest. The ripening rate of shoots is 90-100%.

Crystal grapes are resistant to fungal diseases, do not get sick with gray rot.

Crystal Grape

For clarity, information about the Crystal grapes are collected in a table.

Table: Grape variety Crystal, variety description

Agricultural technology of cultivation

Technical grape varieties are more unpretentious than table ones. They are easier to grow and care for than other varieties of grapes. To get a good harvest, a plant needs systematic care: it is necessary to water, feed, weed, weed, loosen the soil, fight pests, do prophylaxis against diseases, and cover for the winter.

Landing

Seedlings for planting on your site need to be bought from experienced growers or in special stores. It is necessary to pay attention to the root part. The roots should not be dry, green-yellow. The night before planting, the seedlings are soaked in water. In the morning, the tips of the roots are trimmed.

Some gardeners propagate grapes by layering. On a well-formed shoot 20 cm from the top, make an annular incision no more than 5 mm wide. Wrap it in moss or fit a container with soil. By the fall, roots grow at the shoot. The shoot is cut off, transplanted into a pot and stored in winter until spring.

Without the use of root stimulants, the cuttings take root and beautiful shoots grow. Cuttings are stored in a pot for the winter, and in spring they are transplanted into open ground.

The grapes are planted in spring or autumn. For him, you need to find a warm and sunny place, without wind and drafts, without stagnant moisture.Excess moisture will provoke rot disease.

For planting, you need to dig a hole 0.8-0.9 m³... Pour a small layer of manure or humus on the bottom, no thicker than 30 cm. We straighten the roots and lower the seedling into the hole. You can make an irrigation pipe so that the water flows directly under the roots. We fill the hole with earth, not reaching the top of 7-10 cm.

We fertilize with manure

Watering

Grapes love water and should be watered frequently. After planting, pour up to 30 liters of water. Then water after 7 days for 90 days. Then we distribute irrigation by 15 liters of water evenly throughout the growing season. Too much watering is harmful to the grapes, as well as insufficient. A week or two before the berries ripen, watering is stopped.

It is impossible for the fruits and leaves to get water during watering, so gardeners make a special watering pipe, and if it is not there, then they dig several holes around the bush and water it through them.

Around the planted bush, weeding and loosening should be done regularly, in the fall the soil is dug up. Top dressing is needed twice a year - in spring and autumn. To feed the grapes Crystal, wood ash is enough.

Wood ash

Pruning

For Crystal grapes, pruning is required. Due to the thickening of the branches, the ovaries begin to crumble and the crop is lost. Fruit vines are cut for 2-3 eyes. There should be no more than 60 shoots in the bush.

Preparing for winter and warming

In the southern regions, no special wintering preparations are needed for Kristall grapes. Only the roots can be insulated.

Grape growers from areas with severe winters remove the plants from the trellises and lay them on the ground. When the snow falls, a snowdrift is made over the shoots. It is necessary to make sure that he constantly covers the grapes, and add snow. If frosts are raging, then they are additionally covered with burlap, spruce branches. The covering material must be oxygen permeable.

Shelter

Plants up to the third year of life should be especially carefully sheltered from the cold. A burlap hut is made over the entire bush and insulated on top with spruce branches, cardboard boxes with light materials.

Protection against diseases and pests

Despite the fact that the Crystal grape variety description claims that it is resistant to disease, some growers still carry out prevention twice a year to protect against gray rot: at the very beginning of spring and during the appearance of leaves.

The sweet grapes attract birds and wasps. Magpies eat up the entire fruit crop. They are scared away with stuffed animals, noise scarers, mirror balls. The whole bush is covered with a fine-mesh net or bags are sewn for each brush.

Grapes in bags

To get rid of wasps, they destroy their nests in the vineyard or place traps bought in specialized stores. Traps can be made with your own hands from plastic bottles, filled with sweet water and hung near the grape bushes.

Advantages and disadvantages

Crystal grapes, description of the variety and its advantages:

• Saplings take root well without much care.
• The variety is resistant to diseases and pests.
• Great frost resistance, can be grown even in the northern regions.
• High sugar content.
• Juicing up to 70%.
• High yields due to pollination.
• The grape flower is bisexual, therefore pollinates other varieties.
• The variety is versatile in use.

disadvantages

• Small berries and bunches.
• They attract insects and birds due to their high sugar content.

When compared with other Kristall varieties, it is better in many ways. The Kristall and Platovskiy varieties are very similar: both are early, frost-resistant. Ripening in Platovsky occurs a week earlier than in Kristall. Platovsky's fruits are suitable for eating, they are early and sweet. But the Crystal berries taste better and more pleasant. Platovsky grapes are not suitable for making wine. Wine from grapes Crystal, according to gardeners who have been growing this variety for many years, is the best, at least in the northern regions. Good dry white wines are made from Kristall both in mono and in blends with other varieties: Solaris, Bianca, Muscat varieties.

In the northern regions, the Crystal grape is considered the best variety. Although it belongs to technical varieties, amateur gardeners believe that it is a versatile variety and is good in a basket on the table, in a crystal glass of wine and in compote in winter.

The main thing is that it can be grown in northern conditions, it is easy to collect and process.

Those who chose this variety for their site have been growing, propagating and advising neighbors in the country for many years.