Stefania and I have both had a cold since we got back from Seattle but Saturday morning we still decided to get out and prune the little church vineyard.
Santa Teresa Catholic church is around the corner from us in San Jose along Calero Avenue. We’re not sure who put the vineyard in but it’s now about 5 years old. The church is on our regular route to the Post Office, gas station and local independent coffee shop. A few years ago we notice that the vines were in terrible shape so I stopped by one day and told Father Chris I’d volunteer to take care of them.
There are just 20 plants and it’s only 20-30 hours a year we have to put in, so it’s not much of a burden to help keep the neighborhood looking nice.
Here you can see that it is a suburban vineyard, right along the street and next to the fire station. The trunks on the plants are a little funky from the first couple of years of neglect before we took over.
We have been able though to get the cordons and spurs trained properly as you can see below.
The plants are very low to the ground so it’s a little hard to work, but not impossible. We’ve had to replace a few of the plants that died as well and the little ones are doing good. The little spot actually produces about 250 pounds of grapes. We’ll continue to keep up on it all through the year.