Roses along Vittorio's Vineyard

Why are roses planted at the end of vineyard rows?  Do they allude to the winemaker’s fastidiousness or flair?  Do they aid in pollination or do they simply add color to a drab, green vineyard?

All of the above is possible; however, the most important mission for a vineyard rose is that of being “a canary in a coal mine”.  Roses are very susceptible to aphid and, worse, mildew.  Once detected on the roses, the vintner has a two or three day window to spray and protect the grapes from the same plight.

Particularly in the spring while the ground is drying from winter rains, vintners follow rigorous spraying regimes with either sulfur or organic compounds to eradicate mildew spores before grape clusters begin closing and tightening.

The vintner deals with some issue in the vineyards every year and no two years are ever the same.

Wind machine

Frosts are welcome and frequent, sometimes occurring 20 to 30 times or more during the winter months.  They actually harden fruiting buds and force vines into dormancy providing a healthful rest before the next growing season.

Frost becomes a predator as soon as buds pop out those tender leaves and shoots around the middle of March through April.  When skies clear and the night air grows still; temperatures plummet and winery alarms sound the warning.  The battle begins.

Where water is scarce (the vineyard is dry farmed or drip irrigated), those big ubiquitous propellers push warmer supernatant air into the low spots displacing the heavier, frosty air.

Where water is abundant, overhead sprinklers apply water at a rate of 50 gallons per acre per minute which freezes and encases the shoots in a protective layer of ice.  However, if a well goes dry during a series of freezing nights, the war is over unless there is a reservoir to tap which allows the well to recover.

Nobody sleeps!!

Vittorio's Vineyard

California’s Winter Wonderland is quite different and very unique.  Instead of ice and snow, our Wine Country displays a vivid color contrast of bright, canary yellow mustard flowers set against a mantle of green winter grasses.

The good monks who accompanied the Spanish expeditionary forces into the New World, brought not only the European grape vine but mustard, which through the centuries, was mixed with unfermented grape juice for culinary purposes and, more importantly, for medical elixirs – a monastic pharmaceutical specialty.

V. Sattui Winery

Today, it grows mostly wild in the vineyards or it can be intentionally sown as a cover crop that dries out soil allowing work in the vineyards to begin earlier in the spring and to provide good soil aeration throughout the season. Also, mustard is a member of the Brassica Family (broccoli, kale, chicory, Brussel sprouts, collard greens, etc.) which nematodes and some other vineyard parasites would like to avoid.  One could say that it is one of Nature’s very effective pesticides.

The answer: “No.” The vines are dormant at this time, so there is no activity either in the roots or the top of the vine. In fact, Australia’s Murray River floods for hundreds of miles every year and each spring, the vines come back as healthy as ever. As long as the soil dries in the spring, the vines will be fine. If the water lingers into the growing season, nitrogen is prevented from penetrating the roots and eventual root rot will occur.

In terms of major flooding, water itself is harmless unless there is a current in which moving debris can wipe out vines and trellising. On the plus side, flooding actually drowns the phylloxera aphids, certain nematodes and other related bad critters, keeping their populations under control, naturally.

Dormant vines at V. Sattui Winery, Napa Valley