Grape growing options Flashcards
What are the three advantages of conventional viticulture (i.e., monoculture)?
- Mechanization (decrease labor costs)
- Reduction of competition from other plants
- Ability to optimize for the specific variety, increasing yields while minimizing costs. Optimization would include:
a. Irrigation
b. Nutrition level
c. Treatments against hazards, pests, and diseases
- Ability to optimize for the specific variety, increasing yields while minimizing costs. Optimization would include:
What are the three disadvantages of conventional viticulture (i.e., monoculture)?
- Plants are much more prone to disease and pests (due to uniformity), and thus need more treatments or protection
- Nutrients can be depleted as there is no natural ecosystem to replenish nutrients, requiring more applications of fertilizer
- Residual chemicals can contaminate groundwater or air
What is the overall approach of sustainable viticulture?
Develop and in-depth understanding of the vineyard to predict and prevent a pest or disease before it occurs, and to time applications to when they will have maximum effect, to minimize treatments.
What are the four steps of integrated pest management (IPM)?
a. Setting thresholds at which action needs to be taken
b. Identifying and monitoring pests
c. Setting up preventative measures
d. Evaluating and implementing control options (if thresholds are exceeded and preventative measures are not effective)
What are the four advantages of sustainable viticulture?
- A more thoughtful approach, with attention to the economic, social, and environmental impact
- Minimize interventions needed through scientific understanding of pests and diseases
- Reduction of synthetic and traditional treatments
- Cost savings
What are the two disadvantages of sustainable viticulture?
- Term is not protected and therefore can be used without a set standard
- National rules may be set too low (e.g., in NZ, virtually all commercial growers)
What are the 4 key features of organic viticulture?
- Application of compost: slow release of nutrients, improve soil structure, and biomass in soil
- Natural fertilizers (animal dung, natural calcium carbonate, etc.): restore natural balance in vineyard
- Cover crops: prevent erosion and contribute to improvement of vineyard ecosystem (e.g., by ploughing in (“green manure”))
- Reduction of monoculture: growing cover crops, planting hedges, and establishing islands of biodiversity
What are the 4 advantages of organic viticulture?
- Better vine health and disease resistance
- Better soil heath
- No spraying of synthetic chemicals
- Cost savings in not having to buy synthetic chemicals
What are four disadvantages of organic viticulture?
- Possibly small reduction in yield generally
- Possibly significant reductions in yield in difficult years (e.g., long periods of rainfall or high humidity)
- Increased reliance on copper sprays, which may lead to buildup of copper in soils
- Cost and time in seeking certification [and possibly higher labor costs, which vary based on location]
What is biodynamic preparation 500 (horn manure) and what is it said to do?
a. Stuffing cow manure into a cow’s horn, burying it in winter, then dynamized (stirring in water, first one way then the other–the water “memorizes the power of the preparation so it can pass it to the vineyard”), then sprayed onto the soil as compost.
b. Said to catalyze humus formation.
What is biodynamic preparation 501 (horn silica) and what is it said to do?
a. Fill cow’s horn with ground quartz (silica), burying for 6 months, then dynamized and sprayed onto soil.
b. Said to encourage plant growth.
What are the advantages/disadvantages of biodynamic viticulture?
- Similar to organic (limited research comparing the two)
What are the 4 key features of regenerative viticulture?
- Restore a vineyard site to a functioning agroecosystem (ecosystem modified for agriculture) to improve resources and limit inputs
- Soil health is top priority, as it will improve the health of the entire vineyard
- Biodiversity (above and below ground) is essential (e.g., encouraging organisms with symbiotic relationships, like mycorrhizal fungi)
- Grape growers improve their well-being by reducing the cost of synthetic inputs and limiting exposure to harsh chemicals
What are 4 common practices of regenerative viticulture?
- Limit tilling (which sequesters carbon, among other things) and limit irrigation
- Add compost to increase organic matter in the soil and replace nutrients
- Cover crops to prevent erosion and reduce water loss
- Animals (like predators) can create natural controls for pests
What are 5 advantages of regenerative viticulture?
- Soils rehabilitated, decreasing need for synthetic inputs
- Carbon sequestered
- Vineyards become more resilient (limiting effects of climate change)
- Biodiversity improves along with animal welfare
- Lives of grape growers improve through less exposure to harmful chemicals
What are 5 disadvantages of regenerative viticulture?
- Not legally defined, so claims may be exaggerated
- Growers need to experiment with what works in their vineyard, which takes time and resources
- Once a plan is established, results take time, which is difficult and costly
- Producers can’t rely on inputs in case of disease or climate issues, which may reduce yields
- Certification costs
What is the goal of precision viticulture?
The goal is for all key interventions (like pruning, leaf removal, treatments, irrigation, crop thinning and harvesting) to be tailored to small plots, increasing quality and yield and reducing treatments.
* Examples: Changing rootstocks halfway along rows as soil fertility increases, or increasing leaf-stripping in areas of high vigor
What are 2 advantages of precision viticulture?
- Detailed understanding of variations between and within vineyards
- Variable-rate application technology: Ability to tailor a wide range of interventions (choice of variety and rootstock, canopy management, treatments, harvest dates) to individual blocks or even rows of vines, with the aim of improving yields and/or quality
What are 2 disadvantages of precision viticulture?
- Initial cost of remote data collection
- Cost of sensors and software and of consultants or trained staff to interpret the data and make interventions based on it.
Who practices precision viticulture?
Considerable upfront costs means that it is only an option on large scale viticulture or high-value smaller estates (and in practice mostly in CA and Australia)
What are the 6 key aims of canopy management?
a. Maximize the effectiveness of light interception by the vine canopy
b. Reduce shade within the canopy
c. Ensure the microclimate for the grapes is as uniform as possible so they ripen evenly
d. Promote balance between vegetative and reproductive functions of the vine
e. Arrange vine canopy to ease mechanization and/or manual labor
f. Promote air circulation to reduce disease pressure
What 7 factors does the yield that represents a balanced yield (with respect to vegetative vs. reproductive functions) depend on?
- Climate (warmer/sunnier/wetter can ripen more grapes)
- Other growing conditions (e.g., soil texture and structure, nutrients, etc.)
- Variety (Cab Sauv will ripen a larger yield than Merlot)
- Rootstock
- Disease
- Vine age
- Style of wine (grapes for rosés can have less ripe tannins)
What are the two extremes that are to be avoided in achieving a balanced yield?
i. Avoid a vegetative cycle (where too much shade of buds results in lower yields the next year, possibly leading to under-cropping)
ii. Avoid over-cropping, where not enough carbohydrates are stored in the truck, cordons, and roots, which weakens the vine in future years
What are 6 effects of promoting sunlight exposure to grapes?
a. increased sugar levels in grapes through increased photosynthesis in the vine
b. increased tannin levels and greater polymerisation, leading to less bitterness
c. more anthocyanin (color) development in black grapes
d. decreased malic acid (due to greater respiration and thus metabolism of malic acid)
e. increased levels of some good aroma precursors and aroma compounds (such as terpenes)
f. decreased methoxypyrazines