I have a grapevine that is totally out of control and growing from the arbor into the trees. How and when should it be pruned back? I cut one vine that was up in the tree and it seemed to “bleed water.”
From the American Horticultural Society Pruning and Training Manual, ed. by C. Brickell (1996, p. 289.):
“Prune only in midwinter when the risk of sap bleeding from cuts is at a minimum; any later, and bleeding may be difficult to stop (cauterization with a red-hot poker is the traditional remedy).”
From the book The Grape Grower, by L. Rombough (2002, p. 44-45.):
“Pruning Neglected or Overgrown Vines…If the trunk of the vine is straight, or is otherwise healthy, you may be able to short-cut the process by cutting everything back to the head of the trunk. You will have no crop that season, but you can easily train the new shoots that emerge as canes or new cordons to bear a full crop the following year. More often, the vine will be such a mess of old growth and oversized wood combined with twisted, multiple trunks that the simplest way to prune it is with one quick cut, through the base of the trunk(s), right at ground level. Kill the vine? No! Almost without fail, the vine will bounce back and refill the arbor or trellis in one season, because it has the full vigor of a large, established root system behind the new growth. The newly regrown vine should resume full production the very next year.”