The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1905-02-24

tshan poor soil, though and sandy soil
i'm Eastern North Carolina can be
made very profitable in ScuppernonS
tGrapes.
A word as to the profit. An acre VIII
set no vines. At three years old with
proper care, they should produce from
a peck to a half bushel each. Al four
years old they should produce not less
THAN one TO two bushels each. At this
time you can still cultivate one-half
the land. At seven years old you
Should be getting from four hundred to
Ieight hundred bushels per acre. TAX
ling the lowest estimate, say four III
,cred bushels at 15 cents per bushei,
(which we propose to pay for choice
grapes. you have an income of $500 per
acre. as low estimate for each year.
Vines live to be over a hundred years
old. The Old Mother Vine is still living
on Roanoke Island, and is over three
hundred years old, and bore fruit last
year though utterly neglected, and it's
roots are bare. Nc crop you can grow
will give UGH sure eturns. Ten acres
in grapes viii insure any man a steady
Income after seven years; which beats
any life insurance policy. While il pro-
lduces some times larger crops than
lothers, it never fails utterly.
To land owners who will set out vines
I'VE propose TO give contracts guarantee
ing a market at a regular and fair scale
,of prices, for five years or longer, they
Ito guarantee to sell US the crop each
lyear, we to take ali the crop that is
gathered and offered properly at the
nearest railroad station, or at our
WINERY.
North Carolina has, in the Eastern
ipart Of the state, more than a million
lacres of land adapted to the growth Of
this grape. Granting that only one
Iacre in each one hundred were planted
land that the minimum crop of 400 BUSH
Iels per acre were produced, and that
leach bushel produced three gallons Of
wine, we have twelve million gallons
lcf the finest wine in the world when
properly made. This is nearly half as
much as California makes. France
(which is not so very mush larger than
Jour state, produces over a billion gal
Ions of wine. North Carolina COULD,
II her people only WOULD, be in this
respect the SOUTHERN FRANCE OF
america, and could make as much
wine as France, the greatest wine pro-
lducing country in the world. We hope
to see the work started. If the farmers
will make the grapes, we will try to
make the wine and sell it.
There is no publisher treaties on
grape growing that is worth a cent as
Iapplied to Scuppernong. Plant it prop
lerly, give it half-a-chance, n it will
make you rich in spite of yourself-in-
dependent, at least. 1t takes a little
Itime. Do not prune it ever, except
when necessary to keep it in shape while
Iyoung. If cut it bleeds and dies, or
does not thrive. Give it a%rborage, and
mice rich soil protected from the sun
land rains by rich loan, or Woods-mould.
and it will grow so fast you forget you
PLANTED it five years before. Don't be
deferred by the five years-you have
the use Of nearly all your land while it
lis growing, and one in full bearing,
you don't want, at most over fifty acres
Ito axe care of a large family in COM
Ifort-even aff1uence. Even if it melted
lyou only 500 per acre. and you had only
twenty-five acres, it beats cotton or
tobacco as a money crop. Don't go in
too big at first; plant five to ten acres
leach year; then the posting n wiring
don't come all at once and break you,
and you begin to get some income by the
time expenses of wiring becomes heavy.
We advise if you purpose to have a
Vineyard Of twenty-five acres, TO set
lout five acres each year. If you want
fifty acres set out ten acres each year.
In five years you will be on easy street.
lin ten years you will be perfectly in
dependent. To n man who will set
|out vineyard we will give a contract
Ito AXE his entire product. Get near a
shipping point so you won't have so far
TO hau you grapes. They are heavy
and must be shipped promptly after
being gathered. We have and will have
facilities to handle them as fast as the
farmers can ship them.
Yours very truly,
SOL BEAR & CO..