Should I prune these branches on my young grapevine?

Question

I am a total beginner at gardening, and am having a go at trying to grow a grapevine for fun :) I am looking for some advice before I prune it, because I don't want to do something damaging.

The grapevine is a "boskoop glory" variety, and I planted it in early spring this year. It is maybe only a year or two old in total. Over the summer it has grown to around 1m tall in total. It looks like this:

It's maybe not so easy to see in the photo, so I have added a drawing. There are two branches at about 30cm from the bottom, and another two at about 40cm from the bottom. All branches are a similar thickness.

I thought that a good way to grow this would be with some horizontal wires across the fence, so get something like this style:

But then my instinct says I should cut off the bottom two branches of my plant completely, and try to train the top two horizontally. Is this a good idea? It feels like the bottom two are probably a bit too low to train across some horizontal wires.

Also, does it look like I should make other cuts at this stage? Should I remove the bunches of fruit completely at this point, to concentrate on growing the structure? As I say, just learning, so help would be great!

Answer 1

Normal advice on pruning grapevines is to do it only in Winter. So be patient, rather than hacking up your new vine now. Choose from the shoots it grows over the rest of the Summer and Fall when you prune in Winter.

Probably best to remove the fruit (now) for this year, yes.

You could also get your wires in place, as that will guide your choices.

And you may want to mulch-out the grass growing close to it.

Answer 2

Once established grape vines can be vigorous, so you need to allow for that in your choice of pruning method. Against a fence, a better option than the one you've shown might be just a single "T" as your permanent framework, with the horizontal branch about 15-18 inches above the ground. Vines fruit on the current season's growth, so each winter you cut everything back to the permanent "T". During the growing season all new growth (that year's fruiting canes) are tied in vertically against the fence. The following winter, all those fruiting canes are cut back to the "T". This is a variation the rod and spur system discussed here. I would also suggest you increase the area of bare soil around the vine so it's not competing so much for water and nutrients with the surrounding grass. Aim for a half circle of bare/mulched soil about 1 metre diameter.