Albert Seibel

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Albert Seibel (1844, in Aubenas, Ardèche, - 1936) was a French physician and hybridist who made hybrid crosses of European wine grapes (Vitis vinifera) with native North American grapes. He often used the hybrid Jaeger 70 (a cross of Vitis lincecumii and Vitis rupestris produced by the Hermann Jaeger) as a female parent. His crosses are known as Seibel grapes.

The in the 1860s the Phylloxera plague cut European wine production by more than two-thirds. As the pest originated in the New World, crossing American stock with European Vitis vinifera varieties was one of the promising attempts to contain the disaster. The vines produced by this hybridization did not necessarily produce better wines, but did produce vine stock that could better survive Phylloxera attacks.

Starting after the 1886 successful hybrid Jaeger 70, Seibel and his company produced over 16,000 new hybrids, with nearly 500 varieties that were then grown commercially. His grapes were widely planted in France and Brazil^[1]. In 1895, Seibel founded a school to teach grafting methods.