Plant · P-473

Frost Grape

Vitis vulpina

Frost Grape is a high-climbing wild vine of central and eastern North America, named for fruit that starts out too acid to eat and only turns sweet after the first frost - a genuinely late-season crop, fresh or dried for winter keeping. Beyond the grapes, the leaves wrap food for baking, the young tendrils are edible, and the leaf, bark and root have a history of use for liver, urinary and rheumatic complaints. It climbs hard and high enough to overtop a young tree, so it wants a fence line, a dead tree or its own trellis, and it is controlled by cutting canes at the base rather than trying to kill the crown.