Nu: When you cut out some or most of the old canes right back to the trunk, there will be shoots arise this spring from near those cuts. Those shoots will be the fruiting canes in 2012. After that you basically repeat that every winter. And don't worry that you can't see buds. They are there and there will be growth from near the cuts. That growth will be good fruiting wood the next year. There is a small chance that things won't go as I suggest. Perhaps you will have a severe freeze and it will kill all or most of the buds. But it is basically impossible to kill a grapevine by pruning. If it grows back even one bud you can make a productive vine out of it in a year or two. Chances are quite high you'll get a good crop, plenty of new shoots for following crops, and a better vine in the long run.

Okay I just looked at the vine and here it goes. There is one cane or arm I think it is and it goes from older wood to younger thinner wood it is in the pic of where it splits into a Y shape and the top one is the younger one that is producing grape clusters all along the cane. Now the older and thicker wood has a young cane growing out of it that is about five or six feet long and it has some grape clusters and down along the older vine I left two buds per node and they have a few clusters of grapes. Older with young cane coming out Older with Grape cluster Young cane with grape clusters Top one is the younger cane, the bottom one is the older cordon.

I'm new to this forum, and I do want to thank Myardor, fruitnut, harleysilo, and others here for the info, pics, and suggestions. One reason I come to forums like this instead of trying Google first is that Google usually gives me tons of extraneous information and links to sites that aren't all that relevant and/or are mainly commercial advertising sites. Usually, if I can ask a question of someone who's knowledgeable in a field, it's a lot more efficient than just searching through the library's card catalogue or wading through all the stuff that Google yields. However, if I ask a question in a forum, I don't expect people to go out and do my library or google research FOR me if they don't already have the info. :) I just see forums as places for people to share info and opinions and experiences they already have - or to direct each other to good info sources. Speaking of "pruning," :O back in May I had a guy doing some yard work for me and he was totally incapable of following instructions or directions. Long story short, after we had carefully moved all the long offshoots from my 22-year-old purple Concord grapevine onto the trellis I wanted to train them to, he proceeded to take a chain saw to the 5-inch diameter main trunk of the vine, right near the ground! (No, I didn't kill him, but I wanted to!) The stump hemorrhaged sap for at least 2 to 3 weeks. I tried grafting some shoots from another (Champagne) grape onto the stump, but I don't think that "took" because it was too late in the season. Anway, new growth has been sprouting from the old stump ever since late June, and the leaves look very healthy. Does anyone how long I'm likely to have to wait for a decent crop of grapes from this severely "pruned" old grapevine?

Good to hear about the Interlaken, those are the ones I need to provide shade. Bad to hear about the Canadice, that's the one to stop the first rays of sun (assuming it lives, it hasn't woken up yet), but at least I guess I put it in the right place. I got the "old" vines moved over to the T trellis. They're only about 6" too low, maybe a little stretching will get them to straighten up and take up some of that. I can't believe how long and thick the lower cane on the Himrod got, too bad it's all on that one and not spread out to all the shoots. I bet both grapes on the Kniffen could've taken up the whole 16' by themselves. I think the T will do better and they can spread out rather than all run down the same wire, what a tangled mess. Now that the vine is pulled over the patch to weed eat isn't that huge, it may be tolerable for the rest of the year. Almost done on the trellis (of course I've been thinking that for a few days and I keep remembering something else needed to finish it). I assume that since I'm removing the whole lower tier and not replacing it that any time after dormancy will be OK to prune that part.