Content
There are grape varieties that delight you with the size and taste of their berries. Unfortunately, they can fully manifest themselves only in the south, where there are long, warm summers. Those who live in cool regions and cannot afford to plant grapes in a greenhouse have to choose from varieties that can bear fruit even with a lack of heat. One of them is Zilga grapes. It does not boast the size of the clusters and berries characteristic of southern varieties, and its taste is quite simple, but this variety is for busy winegrowers. Even with unobtrusive care and no shelter for the winter, it will regularly produce not very large, but very desirable clusters of grapes. Zilga belongs to the technical varieties.
Features of technical varieties
Technical grape varieties are intended for making wine from them. As a rule, the highest quality wine is obtained from mid- and late-ripening varieties, but there are also a small number of early-ripening grapes that are quite suitable for making wine. What are the features of wine varieties:
- They are less picky about soils.
- They can forgive the winegrower for mistakes in care without reducing the yield.
- Most of them are highly frost-resistant.
- Even in cold summers they accumulate a lot of sugars.
- They are easy to form and easy to care for.
- After ripening, the berries hang on the bush for a long time and accumulate sugar at the same time.
- Technical varieties are easy to propagate.
- They are characterized by rapid growth
- The use of berries from technical grapes is universal, and the yield is high.
Description and characteristics
The Zilga variety was created by a breeder from Latvia P. Sukatnieks back in 1964. He was engaged in breeding and obtaining varieties that could grow and bear fruit well in Latvian conditions. Zilga is the result of pollination of the Smuglyanka variety with two other grape varieties: Yubileiny Novgorod and Dvietes Zilas. Its genotype, like some other Latvian varieties, contains the Amur grape gene, which is what gave Zilga high frost resistance.
The variety is not included in the State Register of Breeding Achievements, but, according to reviews from gardeners, it is with this variety and some others that inexperienced winegrowers should start growing this sunny berry.
Varietal features:
- Zilga is a technical grape variety. This does not mean that it cannot be consumed raw, but most of all it is suitable for making wine.
- The ripening period of Zilga grape berries is early. The first berries can be tasted after 105 days, provided that the SAT is 2100 degrees.
- The growth vigor of this grape variety is high.
- The ripening rate of shoots is very good - 90%.
- Their fruitfulness is also at a decent level - from 80 to 85%.
- The vine is trimmed, leaving from 5 to 7 eyes.
- Experienced winegrowers for this variety recommend a multi-sleeved, regular formation with a garter to the trellis.
- Zilga grapes are well compatible with any rootstock.
- The Zilga variety does not require crop rationing.
- The frost resistance of the variety is at a good level - from -25 to -27 degrees, therefore, the grapes will overwinter normally if there is sufficient snow cover without shelter.
- Zilga is highly resistant to both oidium and mildew - 4 points.
- Zilga's flower is bisexual, therefore, it does not need pollinators.
Characteristics of berries:
- The bunch is small in size and weighs about 90g. Its shape is cylindrical-conical, sometimes with a wing.
- Small, up to 2.3 g, round blue berries with a pronounced pruin coating sit quite densely on the red ridges.
- The pulp is slightly slimy, with a lot of slightly colored juice.
- In different years, Zilga berries can accumulate from 18 to 22% sugar. Their acidity is low - up to 5 g/l.
- The tasting assessment of berries with a weak isabella aroma is 7.1 points.
Wasps do not like this variety; the berries can hang on the bush for a long time and sometimes even become raisinized. - The productivity of the Zilga variety is very high. With large formation, up to 23 kg of berries can be collected from one bush.
- The berries are universal in use: you can use them as a table variety or as a wine variety.
Planting and care
Technical varieties have their own characteristics during planting and care.
Selecting a location
The Zilga grape variety does not make any special demands on the soil. What should it be like:
- Organic content - from 2 to 4%.
- Soil acidity is from 5.5 to 6.5.
- Light in composition sandy and sandy loam.
- With low groundwater levels.
A place for planting Zilga grapes is chosen that is well lit by the sun, protected from the cold north wind.If Zilga grapes are planted to decorate a gazebo, this should be done on the south side.
Landing
Planting of seedlings can be done both in spring and autumn. In spring, Zilga grapes are planted after the end of spring frosts, when the soil warms up to 10 degrees Celsius. In autumn, planting dates are calculated taking into account the fact that a month without frost is needed for the grapes to take root.
The planting method depends on the mechanical composition of the soil. If it is heavy, you will need to form ridges and improve the soil by adding sand. It is necessary to prepare the place for planting in advance, one season before it takes place. When planting a single bush, they dig a hole, the depth of which is 60 cm and the width is 70 cm. If there are several bushes, they are placed in a row, the distance between them is from 1.5 to 2.5 m. There should be about 2 meters between the rows.
Landing algorithm:
- Mix the top part of the soil layer with rotted manure, adding about 200 g of superphosphate and the same amount of potassium chloride to each bush. Experienced winegrowers advise placing fertilizers in the lower part of the planting hole, but so that the roots do not touch them.
- A seedling is placed on a mound of planting mixture, the roots of which are well straightened.
- A plastic or ceramic tube is fixed next to it; its diameter is about 4 cm.
- Pour water into a hole near a bucket. It should be warm.
- Cover the roots with the prepared planting mixture.
- Make a cushion of soil around the seedling.
- They pour another bucket of water into it.
- Cut the seedling into two buds, treating the cut with paraffin.
- Mulch the ground around the seedling with humus.
Further care
The main operations for caring for grapes are watering, fertilizing, shaping and covering for the winter.
Watering
Young Zilga grape plants are watered 4 times per season:
- After removing the cover, into the installed pipe, and if there is none, then pour up to 4 buckets of water mixed with ash in the amount of 0.5 liters under the bush. If there is no threat of frost, the water should be warm. If it is necessary to delay the beginning of the growing season in order to protect plants from frost, use cold water.
- The second watering is carried out when buds form.
- The third watering is timed to coincide with the end of flowering.
As soon as the Zilga grape berries begin to acquire the color characteristic of the variety, all watering is stopped. - The last watering is moisture recharging. It is carried out 7 days before it is planned to cover the plant for the winter.
For mature Zilga grape plants, the only watering needed during the season is moisture recharging.
Top dressing
As a rule, the fertilizer applied when planting a seedling is enough for the first three years of the growing season. In the future, you will have to apply both organic and mineral fertilizers. At the beginning of growth, the emphasis is on nitrogen fertilizing, in the middle of the growing season a universal fertilizer is needed, after the formation of berries, Zilga grapes require phosphorus and potassium, after harvesting - only potassium fertilizers.
Grape pruning
The main formative pruning is carried out in the fall. All weak and immature shoots are cut out, the rest are shortened in accordance with the chosen formation scheme, leaving 6 to 7 buds.
Spring pruning is sanitary; shoots that have dried out and rotted away over the winter are removed.It is done before the sap begins to flow, but always at a temperature not lower than plus 5 degrees.
During the summer, you will need to break out excess shoots, remove stepchildren, mint grapes, and closer to autumn, remove leaves that shade the ripening bunches.
To cover or not to cover Zilga grapes for the winter? During snowless and frosty winters, it is better to play it safe and build a shelter. The seedlings also need it in the year of planting. In the future, you can do without shelter.
When choosing a type of shelter, it is better to give preference to the dry-air method. Unlike covering with earth, the eyes will not rot, and the bushes will be reliably protected from frost.
You can watch the video about the experience of growing frost-resistant grape varieties using the Chuguev method:
Reviews
Conclusion
Zilga grapes are one of the few technical varieties that can grow in most regions of our country, and in uncovered cultivation. The not too outstanding taste of the berries is compensated by the high yield and unpretentiousness of the variety. He deserves to be in every vineyard.
“Zilga is highly resistant... to mildew”
Lie. So unstable that it will have to be uprooted. Rusbol grows nearby - it doesn’t hurt at all. At all.
And where do you live? In my north-west, zilga has existed without any treatments for many years. And the conditions for the development of fungal diseases are the most suitable: often rainy and cold summers, annual dense fogs, constant outbreaks of fungal diseases on vegetable crops growing nearby.