I see those on some of my vines ever year and wondered what they were. But, to be honest, I just cut them off when I do my winter pruning in February. Good luck on getting fruit, even with cuttings, as at least one vine will need to be either a male or one of the self-fertile (perfect) hybred varieties. Personally, I would order at least one "perfect" variety from Ison's Nursery, such as an Ison (purple) muscadine or Granny Val (green) scuppernong, just to make sure pollination with your other seed-grown varieties is not an issue. Both are self-fertile varieties that are hardy growers and produce lots of muscadine.

I'm coming to this conversation a few years late. The story of my life, LOL! Anyway, I live in the heart of Muscadine country, SE Georgia and have twelve vines in all. Three of them, Ison, Supreme, and Pam are beginning their third year of production. (They have bloom buds and will be blooming soon that is.) Two other varieties and a second Ison, will enter their first year of production this year. (Yes, I liked Ison enough to get a second vine.) The reputation of the Ison muscadine is that it's not very cold tolerant in comparison to some others. However it is one of the earliest black varieties to bare fruit, so if you succeed at taking measures to protect it in a colder climate, you have a better chance of actually getting fruits with Ison than you would with say Late Fry which has better cold tolerance but needs a much longer growing season to ripen fruit. If you like the white muscadines, maybe you should try a brand new one that has just come out called Hall. I don't have this one, but Hall is supposed to be very cold hardy and an early season variety. It's also self fertile like Ison, so you only need one vine. Lane is another new early season self fertile variety that has just come out. The subject of Lane raises another consideration when picking a muscadine, and that's skin qualities. One of the big improvements in muscadines is the skin. The skin of Ison is not as tough or bitter as some of the older varieties. But the skin of the still newer table varieties such as Supreme, Black Beauty, Late Fry, Lane and a few others is crunchy and sweet. So the lady who mentioned her daughter eating the skins, well, if its from one of the newer varieties such as Supreme, I don't blame her. Ison is a great muscadine bred expressly to have a lot of the flavor characteristics of wild muscadines. It's really meant for making jam and yes some wines where you have an especially strong "musky" muscadine flavor. As a result, some folks will tend to prefer the flavor of some of the table varieties that aren't so musky. Most of my vines are on trellises for fruit production. I planted my second Ison to go on a swing arbor. I was impressed with the way Ison has a long lasting two tone red green color phase on it's ripening grapes which I find very attractive. I planted the second vine on the swing arbor for aesthetic reasons on account of that characteristic. Last comment, someone mentioned the red pigment of black muscadines being unstable. Yes, that's true, but the variety Nobel, has the most stable pigmentation and therefor most commercial red muscadine wines will have at least some Nobel grapes in them. If the wine maker is going for a strong musk flavor, they will do about a 70% Ison and 30% Nobel mix. God bless. Marcus

I have three pluot seedlings in my back yard. None have fruited, but my 3 year old had blossoms last spring. It is a cross of Flavor Queen (Floyd Ziaiger, hybridizer) and a red Japanese plum grafted as pollenator. The leaves show a moderate degree of red influence. This seedling set fruit but dropped it a few weeks after as did my pluot parents for the most part. The red leafed parent has small sweet plums so I think the fruit would be of good quality. I expect that I should get fruit next spring. The tree was awfully young to have even flowered and we had a cold wet spring. It is now over 8 feet high and the trunk is around 6 inches thick near the base. I think that is pretty impressive growth for a tree entering its third year. The others are just coming into their second year. Out of about ten pluot seedlings so far only three are vigorous and healthy, The rest were disease prone or lacked vigour. Still, a third isn't too bad for good healthy offspring. Randy Hughes, Vancouver, Wa.

I'm assuming you mean a t-shaped trellis, but unfortunately I don't have room for that since I'm mounting the trellis against a wall and a t-shaped trellis would hang into other plants I'm growing. I also can't do a cattle panel since I live in an HOA with strict requirements so everything needs to look aesthetically pleasing. I know, a lot of limits! Any other thoughts on spacing? Thank you!