How to develop a new grape variety. Breeding new grape varieties

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Growing vineyards has become quite a popular activity among owners of private houses with garden plots. Another question is that not everyone succeeds, since growing such a crop is labor-intensive. To enjoy the fruits of the plant, you need to put in a lot of effort and pay great attention to the entire work process. A vineyard is not an easy task for beginners. However, subject to following and observing certain rules it is possible to achieve a fruit-bearing grape crop that annually brings rich harvests.

Essentially, a grape bush is a vine with long stems, the ends of which later turn into fruit-bearing vines. Only annual vines have the ability to bear fruit.

The grape bush is based on two systems:

1. Underground

This structure is made up of an underground trunk, which is a cutting from which a bush is subsequently formed. Its part, located at the bottom and on the sides, is given over to the development of rhizomes. The eyes located on top transform into shoots, which subsequently form a bushy base.

2. Overhead

The above ground system consists of:

Stamb. A stem growing in a strictly vertical direction.
Sleeves. Vines extending from a bushy head, which can be 35 cm or more in length.
Horns. Sleeves whose length is less than 35 cm.
Stepchildren. Shoots growing from an axillary leaf bud component located in the main bushy shoot.
Sheet. It consists of a long handle and a carved plate. The shape, size and other characteristics of the leaf are determined by the grape variety. They have an important function - the sale of nutritional components of organic origin.

The structure of a grape bush. 1 — replacement knots; 2 - shoots; 3 — thickening of the stem (head); 4 - perennial branches (sleeves); 5 and 7 - roots; 6 - underground stem (bole); 8 - fruit shoot; 9 - fruitless escape

Where to begin?

Growing a vineyard for beginners begins with choosing seedlings. Preference should be given to perennial and proven varieties. Their difference lies in their low cost, which is a significant advantage if the seedling does not take root.

Grapes are divided into:

color;
the presence of seeds;
degree of berry size;
purpose;
terms of ripening.

Grapes are also divided according to the type of flower and are: male, female and self-pollinating. Cross-pollination is not necessary for the male type, since full-fledged fruits grow. Female - to avoid lack of harvest, it is planted close to the male one. Accordingly, pollinated grapes are not the best option for beginner winegrowers.

When purchasing seedlings, you must consider:

strength degree of shoot growth;
downloadable abilities of bushy ovary;
brush throwing method.

Experts with many years of experience in growing vineyards recommend that beginning winegrowers purchase the following grape varieties:

« East". It is resistant to frost, withstanding temperatures down to -18 degrees. The fruits are purple in color and the harvest is stable.
« Laura«. Sweet variety grapes with white and large fruits, not fussy to care for.
« Gift of Zaporozhye". It also has large, weighty amber-colored fruits.
« Original". The fruits are elongated in all shades of pink.
« Codrianca". An early grape variety with dark blue fruits that ripen by the end of July. At proper care and formation, the first harvest ripens in the third year.

Stages of creating a vineyard

To make the process of creating and forming a grape culture easy and relaxed, it is important to carry out all the work in stages:

1. Planting grapes

Before planting seedlings, you should know that grapes do not like heavy soils and abundant watering. Ideal place for him - rocky slopes in direct sunlight. For this reason, the main task of beginning winegrowers is to create conditions as close as possible to natural ones. Planting is best done in spring:

seedlings are planted in pre-dug holes with certain dimensional parameters in the transverse direction and a depth of 70-80 cm;
a 10-15 cm layer is poured onto the bottom drainage material in the form of expanded clay or crushed stone, as well as a couple of buckets of humus mixed with soil;
The seedling is additionally covered with a layer of soil. In order to increase looseness, it is possible to add coarse sand or perlite;
The soil around the plant is pressed a little, watered and mulched.

Here's what experts say about some of the features of planting grapes: “ If desired, weighed down with grapes various buildings The intention is to plant at a distance of half a meter from the foundation of the house. If it is planned to create a vineyard, then an interval of 2.5-3 meters should be maintained between the rows, and 2 meters between the bushes.”

2. Watering and fertilizing

It is good if the grapes are watered infrequently but plentifully. The rhizome zone must have sufficient moisture for the dissolution of nutritional components and the penetration of air masses. Frequent surface watering can only provoke the appearance of weeds and the development of painful conditions. Here are a few simple rules for watering grapes:

In dry times, watering is done four times a month.
Near the seedling it is possible to install pipe or bottle containers made of plastic, inserted into each other. Thus, water and nutrition supplied above the soil level will directly fertilize the root parts of the plant.
Typically 40 liters of water is used with the mulching process assumed. Mulch is a powder made from humus and dried grass. It prevents the rapid disappearance of importance by balancing differences temperature conditions day and night.
Starting from the month of August, the frequency of watering decreases.

The grapes are fed twice. A seedling planted in the spring does not need nutrition, but a sprout planted in the fall requires nitrogen fertilizers. To do this you need:

pour into 10 liters of water ammonium nitrate and urea in the amount of a tablespoon, then pour the solution onto the bush;
additionally water with a couple of buckets of infused water, which will help better absorption nutritional components.

The next feeding is prepared by mixing water and a third of a bucket of mullein. The resulting solution is fermented for a week with regular stirring. One bush needs a liter of such mash, a tablespoon of nitrogen fertilizer and a bucket of water.

3. Trimming and garter

Beginning winegrowers must form and prune grape bushes on time and correctly. Typically, sleeve circuits are used for this. Sleeves can grow in vertical or horizontal directions. The most popular and simplest scheme for forming grapes for beginners is “short horns”, the essence of which is as follows:

two ovaries are left on the horns;
the weakest of the ovaries is removed.

This scheme allows you to achieve a rich harvest with exceptionally large and sweet fruits. It can be used on dessert varieties grapes

Formation should begin with pruning the mature main shoot, which is shortened above the strongest bud at the level of the lower trellis wire. Its role will be played by a 30 cm standard. The remaining parts are removed.

At the beginning of the coming season, the role of the main shoot will be the shoot growing from the maximum bud:

shoots growing on the sides are pinched on it above the fifth node, and shoots belonging to the second order are located above the first node;
before the beginning of the growing season, the vine in its upper part can be deflected horizontally in order to stimulate new branches, after which it returns to its original position;
in the spring, each horn should have 2 branches located on the sides: fruit and reserve;
on the fruitful one, a pair of ovaries are left;
the stepsons growing from the leaf axils are plucked out after the first leaves appear, which will ensure a full flow of light from the sun;
after the leaves start pouring, the formation is complemented by bushy lightening, the essence of which comes down to opening the grape bunches by getting rid of the leaves.

Over time, the bush becomes overgrown with horns, which are subsequently shortened and cut off.

4. Winter shelter

The end of the second autumn month is characterized by the fall of leaves from the grapes. Those leaves that did not have time to fall are torn off or cut off. The branches are pressed to the ground and fixed with staples, after which they are covered. Longer branches are tied.

The role of shelter can be:

Earth;
bags filled with plant waste;
covering materials, pressed down with special shields made of wood.

During the first couple of years, grape varieties that are resistant to frost should also be covered. You should know that shelter for grapes may also be needed in the spring, when there is still a possibility of a sudden drop in temperature conditions. Such manifestations are especially dangerous in regions with a hot climate, when the soil has had time to warm up and shelters have been removed. In such cases, some protective methods help well:

delaying the growing season through treatment with iron sulfate;
creating a curtain of smoke.

5. Protection from diseases

Grapes are highly susceptible to various diseases, the occurrence of which is provoked by plant pathogenic microbes.

In order to protect the vineyard from diseases, you can resort to the following measures:

choose varieties that are resistant to various types of pests;
devote increased attention formation and ventilation of the bush;
break out excess shoots in a timely manner;
monitor the appearance of weeds and get rid of them in time;
spray and fertilize grapes with special fungicidal solutions.

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When growing grapes near walls and on gazebos, the bushes have to be left uncovered for the winter, since it is not possible to bend them to the ground. It follows from this that for wall grape cultivation, frost-resistant varieties are needed. But existing frost-resistant varieties, as already mentioned, are significantly inferior to European varieties in terms of fruit taste. Hence the task is to work on developing new varieties - high-quality and at the same time frost-resistant. Such varieties can be successfully bred by amateur winegrowers.

The main method of breeding such varieties is hybridization followed by the cultivation of hybrids and selection.

To obtain high-quality frost-resistant hybrids, you need to cross various European and Central Asian grape varieties that have good berry taste with varieties of frost-resistant species.

Of the European varieties, for example, the following can be recommended for hybridization: White Muscat, Pink Muscat and Black Kishmish, which intensively accumulate sugar, early varieties Pearl Saba, Madeleine Angevin and Chaush, whose wood matures well; from Central Asia - large-fruited Taifi, Nimrang, Katta Kurgan, etc. Of the frost-resistant forms, the most suitable for hybridization are varieties of the Vitis Labrusca type - Isabella, Lydia and others, as well as Amur grapes; in areas infected with phylloxera, varieties and hybrids of the species Riparia and Rupestris can also be recommended.

The success of the business depends primarily on the ability to select parent pairs based on personal observations of the behavior of certain varieties in the area where breeding work is being carried out. It is important not only to skillfully select varieties for crossing, but also to select the most suitable ones for this purpose. suitable bushes parent varieties. For example, if you notice that a certain bush is better than other bushes of a given variety, can withstand winter, or has better wood ripening and is less damaged by frost, then you should take exactly that bush for crossing.

It is advisable to carry out crosses in the area for which new varieties are being bred, so that hybrid seeds are formed on bushes growing in the conditions of this area. Hybrid seeds should be imported from other places only if there are no bushes on site necessary for crossing varieties. In this case, you can contact any viticulture research institution with a request to send hybrid seeds for breeding high-quality frost-resistant varieties grapes

The crossing technique is as follows. On bushes selected for hybridization, large inflorescences located on strong, well-growing shoots are selected. Upper part The clusters are cut to half along the ridge. On the remaining part, the flowers are castrated. Using thin tweezers, remove the cap along with the anthers from each bud in one or two steps (Fig. 35). On each inflorescence, 50-100 buds are castrated, the rest are cut off with scissors with sharp tips. You need to castrate on the day when the first blooming flowers appear on the bush.

After castration, an insulator is put on the inflorescence to protect it from pollen from neighboring flowering bushes. The insulator is prepared from parchment paper, which is cut into pieces 20 centimeters wide and 25 centimeters long. Then the cut leaves are glued into a tube. To do this, take a half-liter bottle, wrap it with a leaf and glue its edges. The end of the resulting parchment tube from the side of the neck of the bottle) is dipped into water by 3-4 centimeters, then it is tied with a nylon thread along the edge of the wetted area with one knot, the wetted rim is folded back from the bottle and the other end is also tied with thread, having previously inserted a small a lump of cotton wool. The insulator prepared in this way (Fig. 36) is put on the inflorescence, the peduncle is wrapped with a piece of cotton wool and the thread is tightened. The next morning, the upper end of the insulator is untied and the stigmas of the castrated flowers are examined. If droplets of liquid appear on them, pollination needs to be done; if droplets do not appear, the insulators are tied and inspection continues every morning until droplets appear on the stigmas of the flowers. This moment cannot be missed, since pollination before the droplets appear or after they dry does not produce results - crossing does not work.
If the father's bush blooms before the mother's, pollen is collected in advance for pollination. To do this, shake off the anthers (along with pollen) from flowering inflorescences into a paper bag, dry them in the shade and keep them in a dry place until pollination is needed. During pollination, the anthers with pollen are collected with a brush and shaken off over the stigmas on which droplets have appeared.

Crossing works better if the paternal and maternal bushes bloom at the same time. Then several branches are cut from the well-bloomed inflorescences of the father’s bush, brought to the mother’s bush and inserted one at a time into the untied insulators, touching the stigmas with the anthers, then taken out. This method of pollination gives the best results.

After two to three weeks, the paper insulators are removed and gauze bags are placed on the inflorescences with young berry ovaries. When the seeds are fully ripened, the clusters are cut off and hybrid seeds are extracted from the berries.

When growing grapes near walls and on gazebos, the bushes have to be left uncovered for the winter, since it is not possible to bend them to the ground. It follows from this that for wall grape cultivation, frost-resistant varieties are needed. But the existing high-quality European grape varieties, as already mentioned, are not frost-resistant enough, and the frost-resistant Isabella grape varieties do not produce high-quality fruits, hence the task is to work on developing new varieties - high-quality and at the same time frost-resistant, as well as on increasing the frost resistance of existing valuable varieties.

Selection of varieties for hybridization

New varieties are created through hybridization followed by hybrid rearing and selection.

To obtain high-quality frost-resistant hybrids, you need to cross various European and Central Asian grape varieties that have good berry taste with varieties of frost-resistant species.

Of the European varieties, for example, the following can be recommended for hybridization: White Muscat, Pink Muscat and Black Kishmish, which intensively accumulate sugar, early varieties Zhemchug Saba, Madeleine Angevin and Chaush, whose wood ripens well; from Central Asia - large-fruited Taifi, Nimrang, Katta Kurgan, etc. Of the frost-resistant forms, the most suitable for hybridization are varieties of the Vitis Labrusca type - Isabella, Lydia and others, as well as Amur grapes; in areas infected with phylloxera, varieties and hybrids of the species Riparia and Rupestris can also be recommended.

The success of the business depends primarily on the ability to select parent pairs based on personal observations of the behavior of certain varieties in the area where breeding work is being carried out. It is important not only to skillfully select varieties for crossing, but also to select the most suitable bushes of parent varieties for this purpose. For example, if you notice that a certain bush withstands winter better than other bushes of a given variety or has better wood ripening and is less damaged by frost, then you should take just such a bush for crossing.

It is advisable to carry out crosses in the area for which new varieties are being bred, so that hybrid seeds are formed on bushes growing in the conditions of this area. Hybrid seeds should be imported from other places only if there are no bushes on site necessary for crossing the varieties. In this case, you can contact any viticulture research institution with a request to send hybrid seeds for breeding high-quality frost-resistant grape varieties.

How is crossbreeding carried out?

The crossing technique is as follows. On bushes selected for hybridization, large inflorescences located on strong, well-growing shoots are selected. The upper part of the bunch is cut to half along the ridge. On the remaining part, the flowers are castrated. Using thin tweezers, remove the cap along with the anthers from each bud in one or two steps (Fig. 42). On each inflorescence, 50-100 buds are castrated, the rest are cut off with scissors with sharp tips. You need to castrate on the day when the first blooming flowers appear on the bush.

The insulator prepared in this way (Fig. 43) is put on the inflorescence, the peduncle is wrapped with a piece of cotton wool and the thread is tightened. The next morning, the upper end of the insulator is untied and the stigmas of the castrated flowers are examined. If droplets of liquid appear on them, pollination needs to be done; if droplets do not appear, the insulators are tied and inspection continues every morning until droplets appear on the stigmas of the flowers. This moment cannot be missed, since pollination before the droplets appear or after they dry does not give results - crossing does not work.

If the father's bush blooms before the mother's, pollen is collected in advance for pollination. To do this, shake off the anthers (along with pollen) from flowering inflorescences into a paper bag, dry them in the shade and keep them in a dry place until pollination is needed. During pollination, the anthers with pollen are collected with a brush and shaken off over the stigmas on which droplets have appeared.

Sowing seeds and obtaining seedlings

For about two months before sowing, the seeds are stratified.

They are soaked in water, those that float are thrown away, and those that sink are soaked for two days. Then the water is drained and the seeds are mixed with soil of moderate humidity. For this purpose, you should take good black soil, mixed in half with sand.

The seeds mixed with soil are poured into small bags, which can be easily prepared from pieces of an old tarpaulin hose. Each bag contains a metal label, which differs from the others in its shape. Labels can be round, triangular, square, with different numbers of holes, etc. The journal records which combination of crossings corresponds to this or that label shape.

Canvas bags with seeds are stored until spring in a box with soil of moderate humidity. A 10-12 centimeter layer of earth is poured onto the bottom of a box measuring 40X50 centimeters and 25 centimeters high, the bags are placed in one row and covered with the same layer of earth. The box is stored in a basement or other room with a temperature no higher than 10-12 degrees Celsius and no lower than zero. Cover the box with a sheet of iron so that the soil does not dry out and so that mice do not get to the seeds.

Grape seeds are sown at the time when the apple tree is blooming. Two weeks before sowing, the box in which the seeds are stored is placed for a day under a greenhouse frame if there is sun, or in a very warm room if the weather is cloudy. At night the box is taken out into the yard so that the seeds can cool as much as possible. With such sharp temperature fluctuations, seed germination accelerates. Usually on the seventh or eighth day they crack, and on the tenth day a root appears. Therefore, starting from the fifth or sixth day, they monitor the condition of the seeds: take a bag out of the box, take several seeds from it, wash off the stuck soil with water and carefully inspect it. If there are no cracks, stratification is continued.

When cracks appear on most of the seeds, they are washed from the ground (preferably using a strainer under running water) and sown in pre-prepared beds. The distance between the rows is 40 centimeters, between the seeds - 7-8, thus linear meter 12-15 seeds are sown. The embedment depth is 3 centimeters.

Immediately after sowing, watering is done. Watering should be done moderately. Excessive watering is dangerous for grape seeds, since they can all rot, and waterlogging of the soil completely stops germination. The soil must be of normal moisture and loose so that air has access to the seeds.

At favorable conditions Shoots appear in 8-10 days. If cold weather sets in, they are somewhat delayed.

In the first year, caring for seedlings is to provide them with good soil and air nutrition.

After 5-6 leaves appear, the first feeding is done. For one bucket of water take 100 grams of potassium nitrate, 100 grams of superphosphate and add a pinch of borax or boric acid. The seedlings are watered with the resulting solution at the rate of half a liter per linear meter of row. You need to make sure that the fertilizer solution does not get on the leaves, as this can cause burns. After fertilizing, watering is done so that the fertilizer penetrates deeper.

To ensure that the soil does not dry out in the future and is moderately moist, it must be loosened frequently, preventing the formation of a crust from watering and rain. This is very important, since the grape plant develops well only if air freely penetrates to the roots.

In mid-summer, when the roots have already grown sufficiently, granular superphosphate is added into the rows and loosened to a depth of 15-16 centimeters. When the first tendril appears on the seedlings, they are fed with the same fertilizer solution as the first time, but this time a liter of solution is taken per linear meter.

To prevent the seedlings from lying on the ground, provide a support. You can make a temporary trellis: drive stakes every three to four meters and stretch two rows of twine between them.

Seedlings are sprayed with Bordeaux mixture, which is prepared in the same way as for old bushes, and then diluted twice with water. When spraying seedlings, it is especially important that Bordeaux mixture there was a neutral reaction (when wetted, blue and red litmus paper should retain its color). Excess copper sulfate(acids) or lime (alkalis) causes very severe burns of leaves in seedlings, especially the tops, which retards their development.

After the first frost, the seedlings are dug up. For this work you need to choose a warm, frost-free day. Even with a frost of half a degree, roots just taken out of the ground die very quickly.

The dug up seedlings are tied into bundles according to combinations of crossings, and labels are attached to them, on which the names of the parental forms and the number of plants are noted. In addition, make a corresponding list in the journal.

For the winter, seedlings are buried in sand in the basement and care is taken that they do not dry out. If they are still dry, they should be moistened, but very carefully to avoid excess water.

In the spring, in mid-April, the seedlings are taken out of the basement and planted on permanent place.

Raising hybrid seedlings

Raising hybrid seedlings is very important stage breeding work. Everything must be done to ensure that the hybrid seedlings, before they begin to bear fruit, are powerful plants, with a strong root system and a sufficiently developed above-ground part of the bush. Large reserves must be accumulated in the roots and wood of the trunk nutrients. In other words, before entering fruiting, it is necessary to cultivate such plants that would be able to produce large clusters, with large berries, and accumulate in them a large number of sugar, produce tasty and beautiful fruits. Such results cannot be achieved from hybrids if they are stunted plants grown in dense plantings, on poor support, with insufficient soil nutrition and lack of moisture in the soil.

The method of formation of seedlings is also of great importance. I.V. Michurin wrote: “When growing trees from seedlings, in no case should you give them artificial forms of cordons, palmettes, etc., because with such violence to the free growth of seed trees, they remain on for a long time barren... This once again proves that many methods of so-called form culture often cause quite significant harm to the normal development of plants. In my experience, the best form for trees of new varieties grown from seeds should be considered the one in which the growth of each tree of a new variety tends to develop: for apple trees - low-standard and bush, for pears - high-pyramidal, for cherries and plums - bush, depending according to the genus and type of plant."

Grape seedlings have strong growth and, under favorable conditions, very quickly turn into powerful liana-like plants. The practice of many winegrowers has established that fruiting occurs in the third year if the seedlings are given the opportunity to form a tall trunk in the first two years. On the contrary, with short pruning, the seedlings turn out to be frail and begin to bear fruit much later.

To ensure proper upbringing of hybrid seedlings, it is necessary to use agricultural technology, the main elements of which are:

1) deep tillage of the soil and increasing its fertility before planting;

2) ensuring water supply (completely eliminating the possibility of drought, that is, lack of moisture);

3) providing a sufficient feeding area in which the leaves of hybrid seedlings would be well and evenly illuminated by the sun;

4) creating conditions for the development of hybrids into liana-like plants;

5) pruning according to the principle of selecting and leaving the strongest, well-developed annual vines on the bush;

6) timely feeding and watering of plants.

Of course, this does not exhaust the agricultural technology of raising hybrid seedlings; only its main provisions are indicated here. Everyday observations of plant development suggest in each case the necessary measures to improve agricultural technology for the specific conditions in which breeding work is carried out.

To plant hybrid seedlings, you need to choose open areas rather than sheltered areas with a warmer microclimate. It is important that the hybrid nursery is located in areas typical for the area. climatic conditions. The soil is prepared in the same way as for a wall crop of grapes, but at the same time it is necessary to add fresh manure. The site must be provided with water for irrigation.

Landing at a permanent place

Seedlings are planted in a permanent place near walls and gazebos in the spring. The distance in the row between the bushes is 1.25 meters (in the future, the plant density will decrease as a result of culling non-frost-resistant seedlings). On open place The direction of the row should be from north to south. If seedlings are planted not in one, but in several rows, the distance between the rows should be 1.5 meters. Those who thicken the planting of seedlings to increase the number of plants are doing the wrong thing. Thickened planting is the first violation of the conditions for good plant nutrition and growing powerful bushes.

After the planting grooves have been marked and planting sites have been identified, holes are dug 60 centimeters deep and 200 grams of granulated superphosphate are crushed along the bottom. The seedlings removed from the basement are inspected, and the cuts on the roots are renewed. If there are several annual shoots, only one is left for its entire length, the rest are cut off. After this, they begin planting.

You need to plant so that root collar(the place where the roots transition into the shoot) was at a depth of 50 centimeters. If the shoot is longer than 50 centimeters, then after planting and watering the hole is completely filled up, and the part of the shoot protruding above the ground is tied to a peg. If the length of the shoot is less than 50 centimeters, after planting and watering, the hole is not buried completely, but only for the length of the shoot, leaving the two upper buds unburied. In the fall, when the new shoot grows and becomes woody, the hole is completely buried.

In the first year after planting in a permanent place, many seedlings grow very strongly and can produce an increase of 2-3 meters in annual shoots. If hybrid seedlings are not planted near walls and arbors, you need to install a trellis in the first year. Its height should be 2-2.5 meters in order to place shoots on it and subsequently form them into tall trunks bush. During the first summer, you need to give two or three additional feedings, tie up green shoots, and implement measures to combat mildew. In the southern regions, seedlings should not be covered for the winter, but in the northern and, especially, north-eastern regions, annual vines should be covered in the first winter, but from the second winter (after planting in a permanent place) there is no need to close them anywhere.

Hybrid seedlings are pruned in the same way as wall and arbor bushes, but at first, in order not to overload the seed plants, you need to leave one at a time, and only very strong ones - two trunks.

In the second and third years, the seedlings begin to bear fruit, and with this comes a new important period in breeding work - the selection period.

Selection

Selection for frost resistance is made by nature itself during frosty winters. The selection for fruit quality and yield is carried out by the breeder. Firstly, all hybrid seedlings with male flowers. Next, over the course of three to four years, carefully monitoring the yield, quality of berries and frost resistance of the remaining bushes, they select the most best hybrids for reproduction.

Bushes grown from cuttings taken from a seed grape plant often differ from it in a number of ways. Therefore, bushes obtained from cuttings of any selected hybrid seedling must again be carefully checked for frost resistance, berry quality and yield. If the test shows that the characteristics for which the hybrid was selected remain the same in its offspring grown from cuttings, or even become stronger, then we can assume that a new good variety has been obtained. All that remains is to give it a name and begin its mass reproduction.

Increase frost resistance existing varieties possible through clonal selection.

Under the influence of conditions, certain properties of the grapevine may change, and these changes can often be inherited when vegetative propagation. It also happens that not the entire bush changes, but only its individual shoots. Quite often these changes can be beneficial for a person. By selecting for propagation bushes or shoots with characteristics that have changed in a direction beneficial to humans, it is possible to obtain improved varieties. This is clonal selection.

In viticulture, there are many varieties with valuable economic properties, which are obtained as a result of the selection of changed shoots and bushes. If the modified shoots are propagated by cuttings, so-called clones are obtained, which are often given new names and considered new varieties. Thus, through folk selection, the world-famous grape varieties Rose Chasselas, Muscat Chasselas, White Pinot, Gray Pinot, Pink Chaouche and others were created.

Under certain climatic and agrotechnical conditions, changes may occur grape vines towards increasing their frost resistance. By propagating these vines, growing their vegetative progeny in conditions that promote frost resistance, and applying repeated selection, a good frost-tolerant clone can be obtained.

The selection is made after a harsh winter with severe, prolonged frosts. In these cases, in the spring the bushes are not pruned until the buds swell. When the buds begin to swell, the vines are inspected. At this time, it is easy to distinguish shoots that have withstood frost well from damaged ones. On shoots damaged by frost, the buds do not swell and when pressed with a finger, they easily fall off. A black spot is found at the site of the fallen bud. However, the presence of swollen buds is not yet sufficiently convincing evidence that the shoot withstood the frost well. We still need to examine the bark. To do this, make a small cut so as to only slightly touch the living bark tissue. If the bark is of a bright emerald color, then the shoot is not damaged. If its color is dark green with a transition to brown, then this shows that the shoot is damaged by frost.

After this, those bushes are selected on which frosts did not damage the shoots at all or damaged only a small part of them. The best vines on such bushes are selected, cuttings are cut from them and planted in a school for rooting. The strongest, well-rooted seedlings are selected from the school and planted in a permanent place.

If you carry out selection in this way after each severe winter, you can increase the frost resistance of the bushes in each subsequent vegetative offspring. But in practice this is never done. Cuttings of European varieties are usually prepared in the fall, fearing that the vines will be damaged by frost and cannot be used for planting in the spring. Since cuttings harvested in the fall are stored in the basement or trenches, their selection for frost resistance is completely excluded. This is inevitable in the conditions of industrial viticulture on collective and state farms, where bushes of European varieties are sheltered for the winter. But in conditions of wall and arbor culture, where the bushes remain uncovered for the winter, amateur winegrowers can select for frost resistance. Unfortunately, they don't do this either.

To select vines for frost resistance, you can also take advantage of early autumn and late spring frosts. It is observed that after early autumn frosts, the leaves die on most of the shoots, but on some they remain completely intact. Such shoots, with intact leaves, should be noted and observed next spring, especially if the winter was frosty. If they have wintered well, it is advisable to take them for breeding.

Bedbug selection

Late spring frosts damage young green shoots, which in most cases die completely or their tops freeze. However, a small part of the shoots (sometimes 2-3 per bush) still remains intact. Such shoots also need to be noted and cuttings prepared from them.

It is believed that the buds and annual shoots of European grape varieties begin to be damaged at temperatures below -22°, lasting more than 6 hours, and at lower temperatures, perennial wood is also damaged.

Our long-term observations of arbor grape bushes have shown that vines of European varieties actually begin to be damaged at frosts of about -22°, but the degree of damage to individual bushes and vines varies. While some suffer severe frost damage, others remain undamaged or suffer little damage. In Odessa, in some years frosts reach -35°. After such harsh winters, we observed many wall and pergola bushes of European grape varieties that were almost not damaged by frost. This is the ability to withstand low temperatures can be fixed and strengthened in vegetative offspring by repeated directed selection.

It must be said that such clonal selection can be carried out throughout the territory of Ukraine. Everywhere you can take advantage of every opportunity to select vines for frost resistance.

Wide participation of amateur winegrowers in this work can play a very important role in the creation of frost-resistant, high-quality grape varieties.

Advantages of hybrid forms

During the observation period, the hybrid form indicates strong growth energy and good resistance to diseases (according to my agricultural technology, it was not treated with pesticides either in the past year or before the time of writing the material - for the 2nd decade of August 2009).
Other advantages of the form include resistance to cracking of berries and the ability to long-term preserve the commercial properties of grapes not harvested from the bush during the period of physiological ripeness of the berries (essentially for an amateur vineyard).
Frost resistance. Last year, the piece of bunch left on the vine waited for... frost!
The form also showed another valuable feature in the color of the berries. In colored species, after full ripening, usually the intensity of the color of the berries does not change the best side. Berries pink species turn red with spotted flowers, reddish varieties can turn dark burgundy or even purple. The same form retained its pink color until frost.

Personal experience of accidentally obtaining a new grape hybrid

Such properties appear in a variety that this year ripened immediately or a couple of days earlier than Pervozvanny (these forms are grafted onto one bush). With all this, despite the early ripening period and very large berries (more than 4 cm in length), the sugar accumulation and harmonious taste of the berries in this form are excellent. Particularly striking changes that appeared during the observation period include the exceptional beauty of the bunch.

Effectiveness visual perception Almost everything is determined by large elongated berries, the main color background of which is truly amber (without Greenery) and immediately 3 variations of the coloring of the berries, which makes a color composition that produces a very strong memory.

I am not a poorly informed person in this matter, but if we include a subjective-emotional component in the assessment of a bunch, and do not take into account the size of the bunch (in fact, the first fruiting), then we can say that I have not seen a more attractive bunch. So that the shape during the period work with her was not impersonal, she received a temporary working title - Bomb.

The title was formed and determined from a natural emotional exclamation that arises in virtually every person (not necessarily a winegrower) who sees its grapes for the first time. If, God willing, it turns out over time that the configurations are mutational in nature, the clone can be called V.N. Krainov. How should we feel about all this? Relaxed, at least without euphoria. This may be the usual mentoring effect of the rootstock in the grafted composition under certain growth criteria of the graft and less, or actually similar modifications of the modification nature caused by the reaction of the grapes to the causes of the external environment or cultivation technology naturally, I would like these changes to be inherited during vegetative reproduction, but one desire is not enough, everything is in the hands of the Lord.

But there is hope. Including due to the young origin of the hybrid form. In his own writings, Michurin noted that the formation and final formation of the parameters of hybrid forms occurs within a couple of years after hybridization. And the master of practice understood this better than anyone. Who knows, maybe this variant showed up in this case. In addition, the external environment, cosmic and light energy flows, nutritional conditions and dozens of other circumstances, including natural physical and chemical mutagens, during this period could influence the normal course of cytoembryological processes and metabolism of the observed form, leading to changes in genetic traits level. Moreover, over time, these changes can intensify and be cumulative if the source of this impact is constant.

Grapes Talisman

What these configurations essentially represent and whether they will be transmitted or not during vegetative propagation, time will tell. For now, all we can do is wait. I had an indicative conversation about this with V.N. Krainov. When propagating the hybrid form Ataman, he grafted in another vineyard. When discussing the changes in color, shape of berries, and other features acquired from this grafting, he said: “If I didn’t know that this was Ataman, I would have thought that this was a different variety.” We noted back then that such changes in the properties of new hybrid forms could be used for greedy purposes by unscrupulous people. It turned out that they were looking into water...

There were “craftsmen”

I live on a vineyard far from the town, in relative isolation from “civilization” (without the Internet), and even here I hear rumors that some (either unprepared people who do not understand the patterns of variability, or greedy businessmen from viticulture) have begun to produce similar variability of hybrid forms for new forms. They give them other names, and already launch a marketing flywheel to implement these forms. In other words, a large-scale deception campaign is being prepared.

Simple decency does not allow doing this. Even if the reason for the apparently modified traits is mutations (changes in the hereditary base - genotype - of a plant organism, transmitted to offspring during vegetative propagation), then this is a clone, a clone of a variety that has a creator, with all the ensuing consequences, at least moral. Assigning a different name to a form without the knowledge of the creator, in my opinion, is very unethical, and may even be tantamount to theft. Even if you were lucky, and due to certain events, by chance, you became the owner of a fascinating clone, the most you can count on is co-authorship. In addition, by concealing these events, the wine-growing community is simply being pinned.

If the manifested variability in the hybrid form has the usual modification nature (it is not transmitted during vegetative propagation), then such acts are generally nothing more than fraud. They show the winegrower one thing, but essentially sell him something else, planting material a variety that he may already have. In fact, in selection everything is much more complicated than I mentioned here, and the event under discussion, no doubt, specifically relates to one of the methods of selection - clonal selection, in which the most important answer to the question is whether the detected change is mutational (hereditary) or modification disposition (non-transferable during reproduction). Not everything is so simple here; in some cases, even the modification nature of configurations can persist for a couple of years and, what is most unusual, for several vegetative generations. This paradox even has a scientific definition - long modification. To avoid punctures and not later look like little boys for beating, breeders have worked out the appropriate development.

The technique of crossing is quite simple; For this purpose, the mother plant is first prepared.

Preparing the mother plant

Most grape varieties have bisexual flowers and in pure-varietal plantings, as a rule, self-pollinate, that is, the egg is fertilized by pollen that develops on the same or neighboring flower.

In order to prevent the process of self-pollination or intra-varietal pollination (with pollen from flowers of neighboring bushes), pollen should be removed within the inflorescence. This process of removing pollen is called "castration". Castration begins 2-3 days before flowering begins. Castration is carried out using tweezers, which carefully remove the flower cap (corolla) and at the same time the anthers with pollen. If the flower has short stamen filaments and the anthers sit at the level of the stigma of the pistil or below it, then in this case only the cap of the flower is removed first, and then the stamen filaments with anthers are torn off.

Not all flowers in the inflorescence are castrated, but only 40-50% of the total number, approximately 100-150. The remaining flowers are cut off in such a way that the castrated flowers are located evenly on the inflorescence. After castration, the inflorescence should be immediately isolated using a bag made of parchment paper. The paper insulator prevents the flowers from possible hit they have pollen on them.

When using varieties with a functionally female flower type for hybridization, castration is not carried out, since the pollen of these flowers is not capable of fertilization. However, such flowers are also isolated until artificial pollination.

Harvesting pollen from the paternal plant

Then they begin to collect pollen from the father plant. For this purpose, during the flowering of the parent plant, the stamen filaments with anthers are collected in paper bags, after which they are transferred indoors and spread on paper to dry and ripen. After a day or two, when the anthers burst, the pollen is separated from the filaments and anthers by sifting through a silk sieve and placed in test tubes. Harvested pollen should be stored in a dry and cool place. In the case when the flowering of the mother and father plants coincides, the pollen of the father plant is not collected, and to fertilize the mother plant, the plucked inflorescences of the father plant are shaken over the inflorescence of the mother plant. If the flowering of the father's plant is later than the mother's, it is necessary to artificially either accelerate the flowering of the father's plant or delay the flowering of the mother's plant.

You can speed up the onset of flowering by layering with vines. As observations have shown, flowering on layering occurs 7-10 days earlier compared to flowering on ordinary bushes. Flowering is accelerated even more if greenhouse frames are installed above the bushes. The onset of flowering can be delayed by snow retention and late spring watering. Flowering can be delayed for a longer period if you dig a hole under the bushes intended for hybridization, pour snow into it and cover it with straw and soil.

With more early flowering pollen from paternal plants can be prepared in advance and stored until the moment of use. Under appropriate conditions of heat and humidity, pollen can be stored for a year.

Pollination process

After collecting pollen or inflorescences with pollen, they begin to artificially apply pollen from the father’s plant to the flowers of the mother’s plant. The pollination process usually begins when a special, slightly adhesive liquid appears on the stigmas of the pistils of the mother plant. To prevent pollen from foreign varieties from getting onto the castrated inflorescence through the air, the insulator is usually not removed, but cut out from it round hole, through which pollen is applied using a brush or cotton wool, after which the hole is sealed with a circle of parchment paper. If pollination is carried out by shaking the plucked inflorescence, then in this case it is better to remove the insulator and, after applying pollen to the flowers of the mother plant, put it on again.

Since not all flowers of the mother plant are simultaneously prepared to receive pollen, it is recommended to repeat pollination after 2-3 days.

In order to ensure interspecific or intergeneric crossing, I. V. Michurin developed a method of vegetative rapprochement. To do this, the original forms are grafted before crossing. It is possible to graft the future paternal form onto the maternal and, conversely, the maternal onto the paternal. As a result of the mutual influence of the scion on the rootstock, pollen or an egg, biologically more similar, appears, and the process of fertilization occurs.

In some cases, to overcome uncrossability, they use a mixture of pollen of several species or mix maternal pollen with paternal pollen. A. Ya. Kuzmin has developed another way to overcome non-crossing, which consists of late application of pollen to the stigma of the pistil, when the stigma is on the verge of dying.

After the berries have developed to the size of a pea, the parchment insulators are removed and gauze bags are put on instead to better preserve the hybrid seeds.

Working with seeds

The resulting hybrid berries remain on the bushes until the seeds are completely ripened. Then the bunches are removed from the bushes along with gauze bags and transferred to a storage room. In winter, the seeds are removed from the berries, washed thoroughly and lightly dried on well-ventilated racks. Then the seeds are placed in damp sand and stored in clay pots. unheated rooms at a temperature of 5-7 degrees Celsius. The room where the seeds are stored (at the same time stratified) should not be excessively humid. Two weeks before sowing in the ground or greenhouses, they are transferred to a warm room, where, after transplanting into boxes with sand, the process of swelling and the beginning of seed germination occurs.

The sprouted seeds are transplanted into greenhouses or directly onto ridges in the ground. Transplanting seeds into the ground should be done at a time so that the seeds do not experience sudden temperature fluctuations.

Sowing seeds in greenhouses is carried out at a distance of 8 cm between rows from each other and is covered with humus, half mixed with river sand, to a depth of 3-4 cm. When sowing in the ground, the distance between plants in a row is 10-12 cm, and row from row located depending on the scale of work and methods of mechanized tillage. With a small amount of selection work and manual processing of the ridges, the distance between the rows is 35-40 cm. With horse cultivation, the row spacing increases to 70-75 cm. Caring for seedlings consists of maintaining the necessary soil moisture, combating weeds, diseases and pests.

From the moment of seed germination until young seedlings enter a state of full fruiting, good conditions for development are created for hybrid plants.

Guided Parenting

At a young age, a hybrid plant, being plastic, can develop certain properties that correspond to environmental conditions. The growing conditions of a hybrid plant are crucial for identifying the required characteristics and properties and the time of seedlings entering fruiting.

On the issue of creating new varieties by the method of hybridization and directed education, I. V. Michurin wrote: “In this matter, everything depends on the experienced selection of combinations of crossed pairs, plants and, mainly, on the expedient education of hybrid seedlings at a young age. Here, the qualities of the future variety almost entirely depend on the regime of its cultivation.” Through targeted education, it is necessary to teach the plant to easily tolerate all the unfavorable conditions of a given area. Thus, if the task is to breed productive, high-quality and cold-resistant varieties, hybrid seedlings should be placed in natural conditions of low winter temperatures. Seedlings obtained, for example, from crossing European grape varieties with Amur grapes should be lightly covered with soil in the first year, and then they should gradually be taught to move winter temperatures without any covering with earth. In addition, to increase cold resistance, you can use the “mentor” method of education developed by I.V. Michurin. For this purpose, young seedlings need to be grafted onto a cold-resistant rootstock of Amur grapes, or a cutting of this cold-resistant species is grafted onto the seedling. Under the influence of a cold-resistant rootstock or scion, the property of cold resistance is enhanced in a hybrid seedling.

If the task is to develop Muscat that is resistant to oidium and mildew diseases, then, in addition to crossing this variety with some American disease-resistant variety, sometimes it is necessary to strengthen this resistance again by grafting. The same method of directed education can be used when breeding more productive varieties with early ripening of berries and with other signs and properties. In particular, with distant interspecific hybridization, there is often a need to improve the quality of the variety. For this purpose, cuttings of high-quality European grape varieties are grafted onto the seedling. In this case, the tissues of the seedling are built from the nutrients produced by the leaves of a high-quality European variety, due to which the same trait develops in the hybrid seedling.

Improving the quality of the variety and increasing the yield can be achieved by improving nutritional conditions a year before the start of fruiting. To do this, organic fertilizers are applied in mixtures with granular phosphorus and potassium fertilizers. In the year of the beginning of fruiting, the amount of fertilizer applied increases.

To ensure strong growth and rapid entry into fruiting, seedlings should not be replanted frequently, and the leaf surface should not be reduced when pruning. Transplantation of seedlings should be done only after the first rejection at one year of age.

When transplanting, seedlings are given normal distances between bushes and rows established for a fruit-bearing vineyard in a given area, while root system should be significantly deeper compared to its location in a one-year-old seedling. In this case, the shoots are pruned long, which promotes early entry young plant into fruiting.

Rejection

But not all seedlings obtained should be brought to fruiting. Some seedlings can be selected and discarded at an early age. Depending on the task at hand, selection of unsuitable seedlings can be carried out different ways and for various reasons.

For example, when breeding cold-resistant varieties, seedling selection is achieved naturally. Those part of the seedlings that do not have sufficient cold resistance, if left for the winter without covering with soil, will have varying degrees of damage from winter frosts. Seedlings severely damaged by frost may be rejected in the first year if they do not have other valuable characteristics and it is not intended to be treated with them in the future. extra work to enhance their cold resistance by grafting. By the ripening time of the vine, one can also judge the property of cold resistance and the duration of the growing season. The faster and better the annual shoots of seedlings ripen, the more cold-resistant the latter are.

In the spring of each year, seedlings can be selected not only for cold resistance, but also for other characteristics. During the development of fungal diseases or during artificial infection, it is necessary to select the most disease-resistant seedlings. During the flowering period of grapes, seedlings with abnormal flower structure can be isolated and rejected.

Evaluation of the resulting hybrids

The most complete assessment of the resulting hybrids can be given only after they have entered fruiting. It must be borne in mind that in the first year of fruiting it is impossible to judge the yield and quality of the fruit, since at this time both the clusters and berries are usually smaller. As further development grapes and improved nutritional conditions, the size of bunches and berries gradually increases and the quality indicators of plants are revealed.

It is necessary to remember the instructions of T. D. Lysenko that “ good varieties plants, as well as good breeds of animals in practice have always been created and are created only under the condition of good agricultural technology and good zootechnics. With poor agricultural technology, not only can bad varieties never be produced into good ones, but in many cases even good cultivated varieties turn bad after several generations.” Therefore, newly obtained hybrids must receive good agricultural technology, since under poor growth and development conditions, valuable traits and properties may change for the worse in the future.

How great the importance of abundant nutrition of hybrid seedlings is can be judged from the data obtained by A.K. Ayvazyan, who grew seedlings when added to one square meter 18 kg of humus, 150 g of superphosphate and 20 g of ash.

The seedlings grown on such an agricultural background were characterized not only by strong growth, but also formed fruit buds, starting from 12-13 nodes and above.

In the second year of the growing season, seedlings, as a rule, begin to bear fruit, which makes it possible to select valuable numbers not only based on growth and morphological characteristics shoots and leaves, but also in terms of yield.

Seedlings grown with abundant nutrition in the third year in terms of overall growth vigor and fruiting do not differ from ordinary bushes that have already entered the fruiting season.

Abundant nutrition not only accelerates the fruiting of seedlings, but also contributes to the development of valuable traits in them. If in the first year of seedling development fruit buds develop starting from the 12-13th node, then in two-year-old and older plants the development of fruit buds moves closer to the base of the shoot.

Further propagation of newly developed varieties

Further propagation of newly bred varieties is carried out by cuttings. It must be remembered that not all cuttings can provide valuable traits of a new variety. Therefore, special attention should be paid to selecting the best bushes and cuttings within bushes. Considering that vegetative deviations often appear on young bushes, if cuttings are selected incorrectly, the variety can be deteriorated and, conversely, with careful selection of the best cuttings, the variety can be improved.

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