Loving Locust

With a bit over 2 acres of land to play around with, I could have a woodlot. But I don’t. (I do harvest a lot of sunlight, though.) Still, because this is what I call a farmden (more than a garden, less than a farm), trees, aside from fruit trees, have to fit into the picture. To wit, four sugar maples planted  in 1997 as a sugarbush for tapping in another 20 years and my locust mini-grove.

Locust -- black locust, Robinia pseudoacacia, that is -- is a tree of many qualities. For starters, the roots can garner nitrogen from the air and put it into a form the tree can use, eventually putting it in the soil. Black locust also laughs off heat, drought, air pollution, and road salt. The tree’s craggy branches and deeply furrowed bark are fondly reminiscent of those trees that hugged Dorothy on the yellow brick road to Oz. Towards the end of next month, chains of pale lavender blossoms will be dangling from the branches. More than just pretty, these flowers fill the air with a sweet aroma that carries far.

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What more could one ask from a tree? Wood! Some of which I was harvesting from my locust mini-grove last week. The grove is a stand of locusts of various ages popping up in a swathe about 15 feet wide by about 60 feet long. Forsythia shares that space as understory, new plants developing wherever canes arch to the ground to root. The locust grove formed naturally from a long-gone nearby grove on a neighbor’s property, felled by chainsaws, the new plants arising from dropped seeds as well as from root suckers.

Locust is one of the best woods for burning, but cutting trees from my mini-grove for firewood would hardly be worth it. One week in winter would decimate the small patch.

The locust I cut is destined for posts. Locust is one of the most rot-resistant woods, putting even cedar to shame. It can outlast pressure-treated wood, offering a nice rustic look to boot. Spring, before the leaves come out, is a perfect time for cutting locust for posts because that’s when the bark peels off easily in long strips.

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The locust posts are for a new grape trellis. My grapes started out being trained to the traditional 4-arm Kniffen system, on two wires, one at 6 feet and the other at 3 feet from the ground. Two canes, originating near a central trunk, are trained horizontally in either direction along each wire to give a total of 4 canes each shortened to about 10 buds long. (A “cane” is a one-year-old stem.

The 4-arm Kniffen system has its limitations in terms of exposing the vine to maximum light, which translates into better-tasting grapes, and keeping foliage and berries dry, which translates into less disease.

So,a few years ago I morphed the vines to the high wire cordon system. A trunk about 6 feet high branched into two permanent arms (cordons) that travelled in opposite directions along a wire at trunk height. In this case, instead of being left with 4 long canes after pruning, the vine is left with many short canes drooping downwards right off the cordons.

We bag some of grape bunches to foil the birds and the bees, as well as other pests. Bagging also lets fruits hang on the vine longer without damage and so develop sweetness and aromatics that make for finest flavor. The problem with the 4-arm Kniffen and high wire cordon systems of training are that the fruiting shoots droop downwards, which makes bagging difficult and puts the bags at an angle that defies gravity, not a good thing. Which is why my grapes have morphed again, this time to a 5-wire trellis system.

The latest incarnation of grape support consists, then, of sturdy T-trellises spaced 10 feet apart. Running perpendicularly to the cross-arms of the T are 5 wires, the middle one to support 2 cordons growing off horizontally in opposite directions atop each vine’s 7 foot high trunk. The other wires will support the fruiting shoots that grow from short canes along the cordon perpendicularly to the outrigging wires. The more horizontal growth of the fruiting shoots should make bagging easier.

So it’s locust wood from my mini-grove that will deserve some thanks for luscious grapes.

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Not everyone is as enamored with black locust as I am. Many classify it as an invasive plant; here in New York, I’ve seen it classified as a native invasive plant. It originated in southeastern U.S. but now ranges far and wide because of its fecundity and it’s tolerance for a wide range of conditions below and above ground. The tree’s beauty and utility have also contributed to its spread, by humans.

My only beef with black locust is with its thorns. Still, I like my black locusts and I like my grapes.

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Pruning, Not Too Late

Nicole, from near Madison, WI won the grow GROW FRUIT NATURALLY book giveaway. Congratulations Nicole! Contact me through my website, www.leereich.com with your mailiing address so I can get the book out to you.

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Time is running out to finish pruning my kiwi and grape vines, apple, pear, cornelian cherry, filbert, and chestnut trees, rose, gooseberry, currant, blueberry, raspberry, blackberry, yew, and fothergilla bushes . . . now that I list most of them, it doesn’t really seem like too, too much still to prune. Some people worry that it’s too late to prune. Nope. Most pruning is done during the dormant season, that is, anytime plants are not growing or, if deciduous, leafless. (A notable exception is spring-blooming shrubs, which are best pruned right AFTER they finish flowering. For more on all aspects of pruning, see my book, THE PRUNING BOOK.)

Kiwi, before pruning

I’ll usually do a little pruning in autumn, after leaves fall, but mostly I’ll be grabbing pruning shears, loppers, and saw as I go out the back door in late February or March, after the coldest part of winter is over. Waiting is most important with plants that are least cold-hardy because these plants tolerate cold better if left alone and, by waiting, I can see what has been damaged during winter. Buds on damaged stems aren’t swelling up this time of year so those stems can be cut off.

A few plants warrant dragging out that waiting period even longer, until they are in bloom, which is when they heal quickest. Peaches are prone to infections at wounds, pruning or otherwise, making these trees good candidates for waiting.

Kiwi, after pruning

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I may also wait to prune my grape vines until new shoot growth is underway because then they are less likely to bleed sap.

Bleeding sap worries many gardeners. Isn’t the plant suffering from that gaping wound oozing a watery fluid? No, bleeding does no harm to grape vines. But some of my grapevines climb along the arbor over my patio. It’s very pleasant to sit outdoors on that patio on warm, spring days; it’s very unpleasant to sit there with sap dripping on my head.

Kiwi vines also bleed. No matter. My kiwi vines climb a strictly functional trellis below which we don’t sit.

Root pressure of water being forced up the vines is what makes grape and kiwi vines bleed. Once leaves unfold, they take up that pressure and bleeding ceases.

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Bleeding is most welcome from maple trees. What comes out this time of year is a dilute, sugary sap that, when boiled down to concentrate the sugars, yields maple syrup and, if boiled down still more, maple sugar. Sugar concentration in the sap can vary, depending on such factors as temperatures, age of tree, site, soil fertility, and moisture. Typically, the ratio of sap to finished syrup is 40 to 1.

It’s not root pressure that’s forcing sap out the spiles I’ve tapped into holes bored into two sugar maples. Maple sap runs best when temperatures fluctuate between 20-something degree nights and 40-something degree days. Cooling temperatures cause gas bubbles in the trees xylem cells (the inner ring of trees’ cells in which liquid is conducted upwards from the roots) to shrink and to dissolve. Something’s got to fill that newfound space, so more liquid is sucked up from the roots and into the cells. As temperatures drop further, ice forms and gases are locked within the developing ice.

Come morning, pressure builds in the cells as rising temperatures melt the ice and release the gases, forcing liquid out any holes in the bark. That liquid makes its way out the spiles, thence to buckets hanging beneath the stiles, and finally to a large pot that sits and steams on my woodstove through February and March. When the sap reaches 67% sugar, boils at 219° F., or tastes like maple syrup, it’s ready to be bottled up. For me, this has been a good year, with over 5 quarts of syrup already from only 4 taps.

Only a few trees can be tapped for their sap. Any maple can, as can black walnut and butternut. Each yields a syrup with a different flavor. Birch trees also release a sap that can be boiled down to make a tasty syrup; in this case, though, it is root pressure, as with grapes, that forces out the sap.