Backyard Nature Wednesday: Muscadines

Muscadines are native Southern vines that are valued for their fruit, thick-skinned sweet grapes that make excellent jelly, a favorite of mine in my childhood. They also can be made into a sweet table wine which many people enjoy. Moreover, the vines themselves provide a touch of color in the autumn landscape as their leaves change to their fall colors.

The quick-growing vines will provide enough growth each year to arch over and shade a walkway, an arbor, or provide an umbrella of shade over a deck or terrace. Indeed, the vines should be carefully pruned each year to direct their growth and to keep them from taking over the world! 

The grapes begin to ripen at this time of year. The bunches don't ripen uniformly; rather, they turn color one or two at a time in each cluster. I have only two vines in my garden and they don't provide enough fruit for a lot of preserving. But they do provide enough for me to pluck a few for a snack as I walk by. And they serve their main purpose which is to provide food for wildlife - especially the birds. As the fruits ripen and fall to the ground, mockingbirds are on them like ducks on a June-bug! They do love those muscadines.

As more of the leaves fall, the fruits will be exposed to the sun and ripening will come more quickly.

Muscadines are very hardy vines that are resistant to many of the diseases that afflict grape stocks that come from Europe or other parts of the world. They are easily grown in the South, where, in fact, they grow wild, and they require very little care beyond winter pruning, but their fruit production can certainly be enhanced by the regular application of a 10-10-10 fertilizer or organic plant food. 

Backyard Nature Wednesday: Muscadines

One of the disadvantages of living in subtropical Southeast Texas is that we don't get that much autumn leaf color here. There are a few trees, some of them non-native like the Chinese tallow, that do present good color but they are the exceptions. I have a Shumard red oak in my front yard and in some years it has blazing colors, but it's a bit unpredictable. One plant I can depend on showing some fall color is the native grape, muscadine. 

My two muscadine vines, a 'Cowart' and a 'Fry' cultivar, beginning to "color up" in late November.

I grow muscadines in my garden more as an homage to my childhood than for any actual use. Muscadines grew rampantly in the area where I grew up and I used to look forward to picking them in the fall and eating them right off the vine. I also looked forward to the muscadine jelly that my mother made.

In truth, muscadines are not really that great for eating because they have very tough skins and are quite seedy, but I was not a connoisseur as a child and I loved them. They are probably best used for making jellies and jams, and, supposedly, they can make a quite decent wine, although I can't say that I've tried that. 

Here are a few of the fruits of my two vines, muscadine grapes.

Since I only have the two vines, I don't have that many grapes to work with, even in years of heavy production like this one has been. Also, the grapes don't all ripen at once - they ripen in stages, so there are never very many of them ripe at once. Thus, I've never attempted to make jelly or jam or to use the fruits other than very occasionally picking one or two to eat. But the grapes are utilized by the other denizens of my garden. Birds and other wildlife readily eat them and since mine is a habitat garden, that is sort of the point.

In addition to providing food for the animals, the vines also provide shelter and a hiding place for the birds. They are located quite near my backyard feeder system and I cannot begin to count the times I've seen the birds at the feeder suddenly dive into those vines to escape an attack from a Cooper's or a Sharp-shinned Hawk.

As for me, I just enjoy looking at the vines, watching as the leaves turn yellow and the grapes turn purple. They add a lot of fall color to my garden.

A cluster of muscadine leaves in late November is a bouquet of gold.

Wordless Wednesday: Ripening