Thanks 'fabaceae' ... that gives me still hope then if you then live in a zone 6 in New Mexico! I live right at 5200 ft. in the city ..zone 7 but relatives in Roswell at about 3500 ft. elevation (?) seem to be in zone 6 but they can grow ocotillo & others in that colder zone than we can! I did go out & try & flex some of the 'Flame' vines .. some snapped/dry but a few did seem flexible & still alive! I do wish now I had planted it on the south facing side of a block wall too.. but thought making an arbor with it would be rather pretty... The VERY old Concords are west facing against a chainlink fence w/slats & they seem indestructible thank goodness! Even being seeded, that old Concord flavor is SO good... seeds & all! The new seedless Concord is leafing out and am anxious to taste those in a couple years to compare to the old seeded Concords! After the minus 17 or so, the Concords that year had weird- very alive but shriveled- green leaves all year & some fruits... but snapped back to the regular look the following year... indestructible- like our 50 yr. old pomegranates & fig! Hope you have a great crop of the 'Flames' this year... they don't get as big as those sold in the store though do they? Heard commercial grown Flames have been sprayed to get the larger size!

The summer ripening among these hold about a month. Then the taste usually starts going bad. Crimson seedless holds just as well on the vine in the greenhouse as in the frig. The greenhouse after Nov 1 is pretty cool as that is chill cycle. I just ate a few more Jupiter. They'd be better to me if I spit out the skins. The skin is pretty nasty. Don't know if I'll even keep this one. Summer Muscat has vastly superior flavor for my taste and they appear to ripen about the same time. Another thing about Jupiter is it leafed out and bloomed well before the others. That would be way too soon outside here. Muscat of Alexandria leafed out well after all the others, at least a month after Jupiter. It would be a good candidate for an outside grape. Those berries are just swelling and starting to color. I hope it tastes as good as Summer Muscat but it is seeded.

Sounds to me like you may be jumping the gun. All or most of the berries should turn red before harvest. Here is what mine look like at harvest. What I don't like about mine is that I should have trimmed off the skinny lower half of each cluster. That way I could have left more clusters with more uniform fruit. The fruit on the cluster tip of many grapes has inferior quality, less sweet and often less color. Notice on the left cluster some of the lower grapes are smaller and lighter color. Well I just tried eating those and they were seriously inferior to the berries up top.

Hi Wes, I do not have an answer for you, but you should try over on the Fruit forum. There is also a Winery forum (forget the name). Those people will probably be able to answer your questions. Renee Here is a link that might be useful: Fruit Forum