Muscadines with much thinner, and more crisp skins already exist, the variety ruby crisp being the main publicly available released cultivar that displays this trait. Other varieties with similar or even better skin thickness/crispness are in development, but so far those traits have been selected primarily from selection and breeding within pure muscadine varieties, not interspecific hybrids. Some traits muscadine breeders would like to see introgressed into muscadines from bunch grapes would include things like more stable color pigmentation, greater tolerance to alkaline soils, greater clusters size, and further improvements in fruit texture. Perhaps also the ability to root more easily from dormant cuttings. So far the main trait of importance that has been introgressed into muscadine from bunch grape is seedlessness, but that’s not the only thing that’s desirable to introgress.
That’s an error on his part. Those flavors are controlled by the genetics. It’s not controlled by proximity to other varieties.
This post is based on a small sample observation and I’m thinking that it might help a little with muscadine growers with a short season that are struggling to have enough warm days to ripen muscadines. Normally I have my vines completely pruned well before the time for them to start growing. This year I had one vine that I pruned a little after it started to grow. This vine appears to be ripening about 2 weeks later than the other ones. Just one time and one vine but pruning a little earlier might help ripening in colder areas.
I thinned the fruit on my (year 2) Oh My and Isons this spring. Oh my … did set and develop just a few fruit. Isons set and developed quite a few fruit. Some nice little clusters with some nice sized berries on.
Looks like I am going to get a good taste this fall.
Pruning later just like you did is standard procedure to avoid frosts, so if you don’t they may ripen earlier or they may get zapped…you just can’t win sometimes
Auburn,
I just realized that Oh My is seedless and self fertile. That’s a big advantage. How does the taste compare to Triumph? I grow Triumph currently and love the taste. Thanks!
I don’t have Triumph to do a comparison. Oh My is a heavy producer and will get very sweet if left on the vine a little longer. I haven’t tasted any muscadines with a similar taste.
You should be aware that Oh My has had hardiness issues in Clarksville, AR, which I think is zone 7b. That is the main reason I have avoided planting it. The U of Arkansas is working on breeding additional seedless muscadines with an emphasis on improved hardiness. I believe they plan on a new release soon, but I don’t know the details.
Picked the remaining muscadines from my Hall vine this morning. I keep some rough records on my vines each year. Sometimes the data is helpful and sometimes not so much. Year after year Hall continues to always produce a good crop. It always strikes a good balance between vine growth and amount of fruit produced. This vine was pruned to 2 buds and it produced about 170 pounds. My brother-in-law is coming to pick these up.
