Budding Knife
name: label: maker
content: Henkels Dansk
notes: label: Description
content: This knife was used by Nathan Fay (1914-2001), the California grape grower credited with planting the first Cabernet Sauvignon grapes in the Stag's Leap District of Napa Valley. Since Fay's first planting in 1961, the variety has become well established and the district is internationally known for its fine Cabernet Sauvignon vintages. When he donated this budding knife to the Smithsonian in 1997, Fay estimated he had used it to bud some 4,000 to 5,000 plants. He added that, in his prime, he was able to bud about 400 vines in a day, and, in his lifetime, he had probably budded some 12,000 plants.
label: Description
content: The first step in budding new vines is to plant rootstock resistant to phylloxera, the devastating insect that attacks the roots of Vitis vinifera, the Eurasian species of grapes from which the world's best table wines are made. Although grapes native to North America are phylloxera-resistant, their fruit does not equal the kind of complex, classical wine produced by the V. vinifera species. Consequently, American viticulturalists have learned to plant "resistant" rootstock, typically hybrids of species native to the New World. It is on this rootstock that they graft the buds from V. vinifera wood.
place: label: place made
content: Germany
label: used
content: United States: California, Napa
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content: Work and Industry: Food Technology
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content: Food
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content: Work
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content: Agriculture
label: Exhibition
content: Food: Transforming the American Table
label: Exhibition Location
content: National Museum of American History
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Gift of Nathan and Mary Jane Fay
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: 1997.0304.03
label: accession number
content: 1997.0304
label: catalog number
content: 1997.0304.03
objectType: label: Object Name
content: knife, budding
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: steel (blade material)
label: Physical Description
content: plastic (handle material)
label: Measurements
content: overall: 17 cm x 1.6 cm x .8 cm; 6 11/16 in x 5/8 in x 5/16 in