General description: The Ania riverbank grape variety tolerates drought, low temperatures, substrate salinity and air pollution well, so it’s an excellent plant for urban areas. It clings to support with its tendrils and so it’s recommended for growing over fences, arbours, trellises and other strong garden support. Tomek is also an excellent groundcover and camouflage plant, perfect for covering ugly buildings or high fences.

Fruit: If the male pollinator Tomek is planted close by, Ania bears fruit. They are small berries of a purple black colour. They are not very tasty, but they have high ornamental value and attract birds.

Flowers: Ania has very decorative, female flowers. They are very small, white, melliferous and have a lovely fragrance.

Blooming: This vine blooms in May and June.

Leaves: The riverbank grape has roundish, delicately lobed leaves with serrated margins. They are medium-sized, light green and turn yellow in autumn.

Cultivation requirements: The riverbank grape prefers sunny or semi-shaded locations. It’s undemanding soil-wise and tolerates drought as well as high salinity, however, as with other varieties of grapevines, it grows best in light, well-drained soil, and doesn’t like heavy, wet substrates. Seedlings should be planted every 1-1.5 meters, 10-15 cm deeper than in the pot they came in. Very small seedlings should be planted in a shallow hole and only covered wholly with soil in autumn. This significantly increases the frost resistance of grapevines and increases the efficiency of watering freshly planted vines.

Care: To build a powerful root system, riverbank grapes need a lot of water. Caring for a newly planted seedling is basically limited to systematic watering. It is especially important to pay attention to watering in early summer. Each young vine requires up to three buckets of water per watering.

Pruning: The riverbank grape does not require pruning.

Props: This vine is perfect for planting next to trellises, bowers, pergolas and arbours, poles and columns, fences, gates, building walls, sound screens, as well as for growing in plant containers and in public green spaces.

Overwintering: The Ania frost grape withstands temperature drops of down to -35°C (hardiness zone 3). Protecting young seedlings for the winter (for e.g., by using agrotextiles) is recommended. At the beginning of November, cover young seedlings by piling a mound of soil with peat about 30 cm in height over the plants. This not only insulates them from the cold, but also shields them against flooding during the thaw.

Origin: Poland.