Approaches to viticolture Flashcards
(40 cards)
When did conventional viticulture become common?
In the second half of the twentieth century.
What advantages did conventional viticulture offered at the time?
Intensive fruit farming
Raised yields
Reduced labour requirements
What are four key elements to conventional viticulture?
- Mechanization
- Chemical inputs
- Irrigation
- Clonal selection
How are vineyards kept weed-free in conventional viticulture?
- Plowing between rows
- Herbicide application
What are the advantages of monocultures?
- ability to mechanise the work in the vineyard
- reduction of competition from other plants
- ability to tend to the specific needs of a grape variety planted (irrigation, nutrition level, treatments against hazards, pests and diseases)
- increase yields while reducing costs
What are the disadvantages of monocultures?
- plants more prone to diseases and pests (require more treatments or protection)
- nutrients can be depleted as there is no natural ecosystem to replenish nutrients (requiring more applications of fertilisers)
- from the extra treatments, residual chemicals can find their way into ground water or the air, creating environmental damage
What can be used to control pests and diseases in conventional viticulture?
Some agrochemical pesticides can be used: Fungicides
Insecticides
Herbicides
What is Organic viticolture?
It rejects the use of man-made (also known as synthetic) fertilisers, fungicides, herbicides and pesticides.
What are the aims of organic viticulture?
It seeks to improve the soil of the vineyard and the range of microbes and animals, such as earthworms, within it and thereby increase the health and disease-resistance of the vine.
What are four key features of organic viticulture?
- Application of compost
- Cover crops
- Natural fertilisers
- Reduce monoculture of vineyards
Why is the application of compost important for a vineyard?
- Breaks down in the soil providing a slow release of nutrients for vines
- Improves the structure and increases the biomass in the soil (the total quantity or weight of organisms in a given area or volume)
What do cover crops do for a vineyard?
- Prevent erosion of the soil
- Contribute to the improvement of the quality of the soil through ploughing them in (‘green manure’) or by improving biodiversity
- Inhibit the growth of invasive and unwanted weeds.
What do organic grape growers use to combat fungal disease in the vineyard?
Traditional remedies such as sulpher and copper sulphate
Potential environmental negatives for farming organically?
Build up of heavy metals in the soils
Higher use of tractors because more spraying is required
Example of how organic grape growers make uses of natural predators and ecosystem mechanisms.
To protect against grey rot Bacillus subtilis can be used to compete with Botrytis cinerea.
What are sexual confusion techniques and how can it be used in organic viticulture to help prevent insect pests?
Pheromone tags can be used to disrupt mating patterns of insect pests.
What do all organic certification bodies have to meet?
Standards set by IFOAM (International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements)
Byodinamic viticolture is based on the work of:
Rudolf Steiner and Maria Thun
Describe the basics of biodynamic viticulture?Byodinamic viticolture
- Builds upon organic
- The vineyard soil is seen as part of a connected system with the planet Earth, the air and other planets.
- Practitioners adapt their grape growing practices to coincide with the cycles of the planets, moon and stars.
- Special biodynamic preparations are used to treat the vines.
What is the biodynamic calendar?
A calendar to advise grape growers on root, leaf, flower or fruit days, which indicate the best days for certain activities Developed by Maria Thun
What are ‘preparations’?
- Homeopathic remedies based on natural treatments
- Used to fertilise the soil, treat diseases and ward off pests
What is Preparation 500?
A dilute fertiliser based on cow manure
- Cow manure stuffed into cow’s horn
- Burying horn in the soil throughout the winter
- Later dug up and the contents are dynamised (stirring the contents of the horn into water)
- Sprayed onto the soil as a homeopathic compost
- Goal: manure is believed to catalyse humus formation
What is Preparation 501?
A treatment based on silica
- Fill a cow’s horn with ground quartz (silica)
- Bury it for six months
- Then dug up, dynamised and sprayed onto the soil
- Goal: silica is thought to encourage plant growth
What are Preparations 502-507?
- Belief: compost has to be first ‘activated’ by a series of starters added in tiny quantities
- Starters: yarrow, chamomile, nettle, oak bark, dandelion or valerian prepared in various ways; for example, the yarrow in a deer’s bladder
- Goal: assist with the decomposition of the compost.
