a different sort of fruit tree

i planted grapes along the fence maybe twenty years ago...they were so ravaged by japanese beetles every year and produced so little that they were never a front burner issue...they survived but the jungle continued to thicken out there and they slipped from memory except on those odd occasion when i would stumble on a bunch or two while on a pruning mission...well...things have changed...either in the disappearance of predators or simply great camouflage ...i was standing at the back door looking out across the patio this past weekend and was asking myself " what is so odd about that elm?" and then it struck me that i was looking at a bunch of grapes hanging at eye level there in the tree ( bottom photo )...i walked out to the tree and looked up and...grapes! bunches and bunches of grapes festooned all over the tree...i traced the vine back to a gnarled and grandfatherly grape plant that had vined up through the tree...across the the top and down the other side...i will need an extension ladder for this harvest...there must be bunches thirty feet off the ground...this is one determined plant that must have been toiling on this project for years...i have recipes for grape dumplings from the coach and i see a batch of grape jelly homemade from an extraordinary harvest of grapes...i am stunned by events in microcosm sometimes and this qualifies as one for me.