Issue link: http://winesandvines.uberflip.com/i/131907
COVE R S T O R Y with how vines respond to cold weather throughout the year. Vines that are accustomed to colder daily minimums— namely, in vineyards that are beset by the cold air pool—won't suffer as much as vineyards above the cold air pool or those where temperatures are moderated by the Columbia River. "If you have a cool year, if you have a higher elevation site, you're going to feel it more than a lower elevation site," he says. "The low sites that were affected by cold air pooling were pretty much the same.…It more strongly affected the higher elevation sites." "A lot of vineyard sites are relatively new, and I think Kevin's on the front end of the curve in terms of measuring these sites," Dinn says. Pogue, for his part, believes the data could also open new areas for vineyard development. Data loggers in the foothills of the Blue Mountains east of Walla Walla have garnered readings that suggest long, if cool, growing seasons. While the heat accumulations aren't as large as at river-front vineyards, the number of frost-free days is encouraging. There's also no need to irrigate, making for more efficient vineyards. "They start to look like Burgundy or the Mosel," he says. "There's potential if you move to higher elevations to limit your frost risk and have more balanced wines." The question, however, is whether Washington state growers want to grow cool-climate wines reminiscent of Burgundy or Mosel, or if they want to continue to hitch their wagons to the big reds that have made the state's reputation for highend wines. Better site selection A better understanding of how air is moving through the Columbia Basin could ultimately lead to better site selection. The right site is a key element in reducing environmental risks, but understanding how topography relates to specific differences in air temperature will give growers greater data to work with when choosing sites by putting hard data behind growers' experience. "What would be the coolest thing in the world to do would be to come up with this equation for the Columbia Basin," Pogue says. "You could have a little parameter for each of the different variables, and you could plug some numbers into this equation and it would spit out what your computed growing degree days would be in an average year. That would be the Holy Grail." Measurements of GDD are a basic method for determining the suitability of sites. They're "extremely crude in terms of what's happening," says Co Dinn, director of winemaking at Hogue Cellars in Prosser. But Pogue's efforts to combine the readings with other information point a way forward. While systems such as Washington State University's AgWeatherNet are helpful in providing more detail, Dinn is excited by the fine grain of information Pogue's monitors are gathering. "We have that information (from AgWeatherNet), which is great, but as far as every 15 minute-type data point gathering in individual vineyard blocks, that's being made possible by the advent of these new, relatively inexpensive data loggers," he says. "It's more information, and that's information that was very hard to gather." Dinn believes that temperature patterns and GDD provided by the data loggers will give growers the kind of information they need to manage sites better. One BirdGardSuperPRO Wireless can control birds inupto 48 acres The Bird Gard SuperPRO Controller/transmitter can broadcast distress calls up to 1000 ft in all directions. And one Controller/transmitter can control up to eight 4-Speaker Wireless Receivers. No need to buy 8 complete Bird Gard Super PROs. Each 4-Speaker Wireless Receiver protects up to 6 acres. Buy 2, 3, 4, up to eight 4-Speaker Wireless Receivers. You get not only wireless speakers, but also the distress calls randomly jump from speaker to speaker keeping the birds from getting used to the sounds. One BirdGard SuperPRO Controller/transmitter & one 4-Speaker Wireless Receiver is $799. Each additional 4-Speaker Wireless Receiver that covers up to 6 acres is $399. More and more vineyard managers are replacing netting with the Bird Gard PRO series. "Last year we got the SuperPRO Wireless. Had the starling flocks been there, we would have lost $20,000-$30,000 worth of grapes," Manager, Hazlitt 1852 Vineyards BirdGard Wireless JWB Marketing LLC birddamage.com 800.555.9634 Win es & Vi n es JU NE 20 13 33