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From Brian Atkinson
Grapevine (Vitis) from the plant family Vitaceae is a flowing vine plant with 79 different species and is an economically important source of grapes, both for the consumption of the fruit itself and as a fruit which can be fermented to produce wine. The fermentation of grapes for wine was started as early as 5000 BC.
The study of grapevines is called viticulture and at the Julius Kuehn Institute for Grapevine Breeding Geilweilerhof grapevines are studied for safe guarding production through studying disease resistances and morphological characteristics in breeding of cultivars for the future. The variety of grapevine shown here for the hidden half is unique to this institute. https://www.julius-kuehn.de/en/grapevine-breeding/
Grapevines produce clusters of berries known as grapes, which can appear in many colours from white, red, black, blue, green and purple. They only produce once so during commercial viticulture it is important that pruning the previous year’s growth takes place to promote new growth and new fruit for the next season.
Approximately 75,866 square kilometres of the world’s surface is dedicated to growing grapevines with worldwide production around 72 million tons a year. From this 71% is used for the production of wines, 27% for fresh fruit and 2% as dried food. The largest grape producing country in the world is China, followed by Italy, United States, France and Spain.
