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Afflictions Bad Weather and Insects. September 24, 1831 Herbemont in this letter collects most of the horrors that face grape cultivators—wet weather, rot, birds, and insects. The terrible weather of the 1831 growing season opens the account, a letter on two of the insect pests troubling vineyards closes it. Yet the depression that characterized his “Observations” of September 4 has given way to a sardonic jocularity. The letter extract introduced to the reader two of the more lurid insects preying on the vine. The first insect—the grape root borer, Vitacea polistiformis—is the larval form of a moth that resembles a paper wasp.1 It particularly troubles vineyards in the deep South, but infestations have recently been experienced as far north as Virginia. In extreme cases, it can ruin a vineyard. The white ants are termites who devour grapevine roots. Published in American Farmer 13, no. 32 (October 21, 1831): 252–53. On the Culture of the Grape. Columbia, S. C. Sept 24, 1831 mr. smith: Dear Sir,—I rejoice much to see the increasing taste for the cultivation of fruit trees, and particularly of the vine in general through this country, and particularly in Baltimore and its vicinity: Any thing therefore that will tend to elucidate the particulars of the culture of the vine, and extend the knowledge of its habits, must be useful, to some degree, and in this view it may not be useless that I give you an account of the disastrous consequences of the last most unfavorable season for this delightful fruit. With us all this summer has been an almost uninterrupted series of rains; such, I believe, as was never witnessed by our oldest inhabitants. 1. O. E. Liburd and G. G. Seferina, Grape Root Borer: Life Stages and IPM Strategies in Florida, Fact Sheet sp 330 (Entomology and Nematology Dept., University of Florida, Gainesville, 2004). 207 The temperature has also been, with the exception of a very few days, much below our usual standard. The quantity of grapes on our vines was uncommonly great; but these continued rains produced a considerable rot in the early part of the Summer ; and this never entirely stopped, as it usually does, after a short period of time. The rains continuing, the effect on the grapes as they approached maturity, was of swelling the berries; many of which burst on the slightest touch by insects, birds, or, I believe, without being touched at all, and this attracting the myriads, the consequent devastation is almost incredible. Indeed, a lady in light colored clothes could not safely walk under our vine arbours without an umbrella, for it actually rained wine. This is not, however, the whole of the mischief done; but this juice of the grape which was thus unlawfully running away,2 compelled me to gather my crop for wine before the grapes were as fully ripe as it was desirable they should be, and this juice being chiefly made up of our superabundant rains, and not having had a sufficiency of dry heat, was exceedingly deficient in saccharine matter, as for example: last year the juice of my Lenoir grapes weighed by Beaume’s areometer full 13 degrees; and this year it weighed only between 7 and 9 degrees, and it required three quarters of a pound of sugar per gallon of must or juice to bring it to the same degree, viz: 13 degrees. That it weighed the year before without a single grain of it. The other kinds fared a similar fate, and it was the opinion of several of my friends, as well as my own, that in my garden alone I must have lost during the two weeks preceding the gathering of the grapes, near 100 gallons of wine; yet, notwithstanding this enormous deduction in the crop, I made from that alone about 260 gallons. Aided by an intelligent friend, we measured the ground planted by these vines, and it was found to be a little less than one sixth part of an acre; which makes it at the rate of 1500 gallons per acre of wine, such as it is. I say such as it is, for it cannot be supposed that wine made under such unfavorable circumstances, can possibly be of a superior quality, although I endeavored, as much as was in my power, to supply the deficiency of saccharine matter in the fruit; yet, having examined it particularly lately, I am induced to hope I have succeeded tolerably...

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