Garden: Vines and the Noah Grape

In the first couple of years here we often saw deer walking through the garden, and caught them nibbling on the conveniently nose high fresh growth of the raspberries or peas from time to time.

Roe deer in broad daylight. 2012

We erected an emergency and very ugly temporary wire fence around the potager with the intention of making a rather more elegant structure in due course. Or at least covering the wire mesh with sweet peas and morning glories, or perhaps a rampant clematis or trumpet vine.

The saggy wire fence shows up well in the snow. 2013

After a busy three years we finally got around to removing the sagging, weed smothered and bendy temporary wire fence earlier this year, having never quite managed to make it into the more stable and substantial, not to mention pretty barrier we had planned. The thick native hedging around the boundaries of the garden has largely kept the deer out of the place, too, although we still hear the roebucks barking in the neighbouring woods.

Early this spring our neighbour handed me a bundle of sticks over his fence informing me that they were cuttings from his own vine but also warning me that on no circumstances must we make wine from them. Puzzled, and assuming that my translation had let me down, I gratefully accepted the sticks, dug a slit trench along the edge of my brand new strawberry patch and shoved them in with few expectations. Much to my delight. by mid summer the majority of sticks had put on new healthy growth, more indeed than my four year old grapevine has achieved in a lifetime on the pergola. It reluctantly gave us two pathetic bunches of grapes this year and will have to buck its ideas up if it wishes to make it through to next year. We have four (more) hop plants on order, all in need of climbing space.

So suddenly I am in urgent need of space for six vigorous and happy grapevines. Further consultation with my neighbour confirmed that October was indeed the best time to move the plants to their final homes, and more alarmingly that I had a very healthy bunch of illegal plants. The grapes would apparently yield a wine high in methanol which would send us loopy and as a consequence the production of wine from these Noah grapes was forbidden.

So now we are getting somewhere; wine making is banned, rather than the vines themselves, but the methanol thing still leaves me puzzled, as I understand that the type of alcohol produced is down to the temperature of distillation of a spirit and has little to do with vat fermentation. More research is required, but more urgently, so is somewhere to grow these things. And somewhere out of sight of the road where they won't be spotted by any passing Gendarmes!

On a visit to Les Jardins de la Poterie Hillen last year I was wowed by a tall rustic wooden fence, over two metres high and covered in vines.

Inspiration from Les Jardins de la Poterie Hillen

Something like that would look fine along the edge of the potager, running from and continuing the line of the house down to the fig tree. And it might put off any deer that do wander into the garden.

One of the perks of living in this heavily forested area is a share in the commune's allocation for firewood. Lots are drawn for your patch and apart from the trees marked by the forestry officials you can clear the lot for a small fee. Because our house is well insulated and stays warm we don't tend to burn more than a couple of stere of timber each year and so have plenty left over for building rustic fences.

Bringing back the wood, October 2015. Some also came back in the car & trailer and some slung over the shoulders!

The first post is in and well eventually support a rose.

The four Noahs have been planted in two pairs one each side of the fence (we may thin to two plants if they thrive), leaving space for two more vines in the gaps. The Noah is a green, tart and pippy offering so I guess the others had better be big and blousey purple grapes. Just like the one (not) growing on the pergola! The top rail will be used for something else, a kiwi vine perhaps as we also have a pathetic example of one of those on the pergola.

The finished fence with the grapevines planted between the posts.

The line of the fence runs straight on from the path beside the house (on the right). A rose will smother the nearest post.

Our neighbour reckons we should get two or three bunches from each pied which is exciting, although the next task is to learn about training grapevines...