Monday, December 29, 2008

Suburban Vineyard Life

This was taken in 2006 when Paul added Mourvedre to the front (over by the blue tarp).







Later that Spring, Paul is watering the young vines in the walkway.




Another view of the "before" vineyard from the street.




And then in 2008 I decided I was tired of watering the lawn and we had Jerry start the tear-down.


The plants and concrete all came out from the front yard to prepare for a mini-demonstration vineyard.






And I mean, all of the concrete...




Jerry removed all traces of lawn and set new wood and metal posts. Here he is below starting to string the wires.





And so it will sit like this thru the winter until March when the baby vines come. Paul has ordered 25 Mourvedre (5 rows with 5 plants each) and Thompsons Seedless for the plot under the magnolia tree in the parking strip. A neighbor down the street requested at least one table grape plant so we're putting in 4. Originally we wanted to put a seedless muscat but none were available.


The plan is to put up one of those "take one" boxes like they do for property sale information, but ours will include flyers on the project, it's costs, and how much water usage we anticipate in the coming months/years. The rest of the landscaping will be drought resistant and require minimal watering. As for the backyard, that's another blog with more pictures coming soon!


I'll update the front vineyard progress after the new plants go in, for now, it's an ugly posted dirt patch with good intentions.





2 comments:

Unknown said...

Very cool. Did you get any complaints from neighbors or warnings from code enforcement?

Paul Romero said...

The only comment/request we got was to put in a table grape plant, which is actually a good idea, and we'll do that.

The posts are less than 5 feet tall, which meets the city code.

The best part is this is a great urban landscaping. It needs little or no water, is low maintenance and doesn't require any gas (lawnmower) to maintain.