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I decided to really focus this year on getting the nutrition perfected in the vineyard. I did another soils test over the winter and found that a couple of micro nutrients, boron & zinc, were nearly absent. And this soil is always wanting more nitrogen, which is not necessarily a bad thing for grapes.

I gave the vineyard two foliar applications of boron & zinc prior to fluorescence (flowering), as well as a ground application of ordinary time-release lawn nitrogen. The response has been noticeable. Very vigorous shoot growth. Keeps me busy pruning all the suckers that want to come up from the base of the trunk.

The boron in particular should help with fruit set. The last couple seasons there've been a fair number of  "shot berries," tiny grapes that never mature with the rest of the fruit in the bunch. These nutrients should help with that, as well as the premature yellowing of the leaves we've been seeing around harvest time.

I'll give it a final application just after harvest. The vines will store the nutrients and use them first thing next spring.