Grafting: History

The grafting of vines as a means of propagation was well known in Ancient rome, and it is referred to as early as the 2nd century bc by cato in his treatise De agri cultura. Knowledge of grafting survived through the medieval period, but it was in the 19th century that it came into particular prominence as the only method of satisfactorily ensuring the continued production of wine in the face of the threat posed by phylloxera. European varieties of vinifera had little resistance to phylloxera. It was only through the grafting of V. vinifera cuttings on to American species of Vitis, which had some phylloxera resistance, that traditional European grape varieties could continue to be cultivated, and thus wine with the commercially acceptable taste thereof could still be made. Early experiments to counter phylloxera had generally centred on chemical treatments or flooding, but during the 1870s, those, such as Laliman, who had been advocating the use of american vine species as rootstocks gained increasing support. Eventually, at the 1881 International Phylloxera Congress in Bordeaux, it became generally accepted that grafting of French scions on to American rootstock was the best solution, and this led to much experimentation to identify the best rootstocks for particular soil types. On a regional scale, however, widespread adoption of grafting awaited the efforts of people such as Gustave Foëx, director of the agricultural school at montpellier, who in 1882 produced a small booklet recommending the use of American vines, written in a clear style specifically designed for the small wine producers of the Languedoc. Traditionally grafting was done by hand, either in the field (field budding) or indoors (bench grafting), using such techniques as the whip and tongue method. Today, however, most grafting in Europe is done by machines which join together scion and rootstock, usually in an omega-shaped cut. In California and to a lesser extent South Africa, field grafting is still common.