Wines & Vines

126 WINES&VINES Collector's Edition VINTAGE 2018 FRITZ WESTOVER COLORADO Grand Valley (Mesa County) and West Elks (Delta County) AVAs Horst Caspari Professor and state viticulturist Colorado State University The 2018 harvest saw the biggest crop ever produced in Colorado and excellent grape qualities due to outstanding growing conditions. So far, we have received information from about one third of the industry. A comparison to the 2017 survey shows that the yield per acre is up about 11%. Taking into account non-respondents, we estimated the 2017 crop production to be around 2,300 to 2,500 tons and (actual re- ported tonnage was 2,016 ton). 2017 may have been the biggest crop ever, or maybe not. There was only a 20-ton difference to the 2015 harvest, too close to call. Either way, it looks like 2018 will come in at around 2,500 to 2,800 tons and will set a new record. The growing conditions were very dry and hot. There were drought conditions throughout the state, reaching exceptional level for the south-western part of the state, and extreme for much of Western Colo- rado. Harvest started very early. Most grapes were already harvested by the end of September. Rain and much cooler temperatures finally arrived in the first week of October, but with few exceptions did not cause any disease problems. The hot and dry growing season resulted in minimal disease pres- sure. From a disease perspective, this was about as ideal a season as one can imagine, with some Bucher Presses Delta Destemmers Costral Bottling Lines Cazaux Pumps Lamothe-Abiet Products Delta Optical & Auto Sorting Bucher Vaslin XPlus Intuitive Communication Controls FULL LINE OF WINERY EQUIPMENT Bucher Vaslin North America 3100 Dutton Ave., Ste. 146 Santa Rosa, CA 95407 (707) 823-2883 info@bvnorthamerica.com BUCHER VASLIN NORTH AMERICA Complete Winemaking Solutions CENTRAL The Blanc du Bois harvest was particularly bountiful in Texas causing tank space issues at some wineries.

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