fox grape

Tina Webb: email: webster@hargray.com; Ph: 843-671-2286; Fax: 843-671-7624; Hilton Head Preparatory School; 8 Fox Grape Road; Hilton Head, SC 29928

To frame a wreath, collect supple willow whips, or better, vines of native fox grape or bittersweet in the North, kudzu or musk grape in the South.

While the Old World had one grape species of note, America had several, including fox grapes (Vitis labrusca), river-bank grapes (Vitis riparia), and muscadine grapes (Vitis rotundifolia).

No one is quite sure how the strong flavor of grapes like Concord came to be called ''foxy.'' The term probably signified a certain earthy aroma, or it might be that fox grapes were called that because foxes enjoyed them.

A potato masher and a kettle will do as well; get purple mittens if the kettle is deep enough and you don't wear rubber gloves.) To extract all the juice from a big kettle of concord or southern fox grapes, add just enough pure, soft water to cover.

Burning bushes are natural phenomena: roses of sharon in fencerows, fox grapes and swollen concords, privet hedges in boxcar trim, clapboards, bless them, horizontal if not plumb, and manmade signs dazzled on the pavement.