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Grapegrowing At the same time, major cultivar changes occurred in now-renowned California locales such as the Napa and Sonoma valleys. The impact of the growing degreeday assessment on wine quality (Amerine and Winkler, 1944) resulted in a shift to table wine production. These locales underwent a significant cultivar change as dessert wines like Angelica (made from Mission grapes syn. Listan Negro [LaMar, 2002; Robinson, et al., 2012]) were replaced with Cabernet Sauvignon, Chardonnay, Sauvignon Blanc and Zinfandel. In the Great Lakes region, the strong flavors and aromas characteristic of labrusca-based cultivars such as Concord, Niagara, Catawba, Delaware, Elvira, Diamond, Agawam and others produced as dessert wines were similarly challenged by the group of cultivars Wagner (1955) called French hybrids, interspecific, resistant cultivars of both European and North American origin. In many ways, hybrid cultivars were a key to the rapid changes that took place in the Great Lakes region and paved the way for the current mixed viticulture there that includes both vinifera and the new interspecifics. appears to have occurred as the result of efforts to solve two vexing problems: 1) limeinduced iron chlorosis demonstrated the need for lime tolerance lacking in the low-pH productive, resistant cultivar; a hybrid direct producer (HDP) capable of culture with fewer pest control inputs and thus lower production costs. Wagner (1955) makes much of this. He points to the rapid inclusion of many HDP selections for production of vin du pays and vin du table. With the difficult periods of the second through fifth decades of the 20th century, when war and economic upheaval reduced the ability of vineyardists to get the materials and equipment necessary to protect susceptible standard vinifera grape cultivars, hybrids appeared a reasonable solution for the production of everyday table wines. To fill that gap in wine-production volume, the HDP cultivars and selections became widely grown (Galet, 1977). Improved cold hardiness of the subsequent Vitis selections was one unintended but significant result of interspecific crossing, especially with V. riparia. Interspecific hybrids The subject of interspecific hybrids among Vitis species has an interesting history. It adapted species riparia and rupestris (Gale, 2011); and 2) the poor rooting efficiency and graft compatibility with vinifera of the V. Berlandieri species even though it was selected for its ability to thrive in calcareous soils (Schmid, et al., 2008). Attempts to solve both concerns often involved the use of vinifera parents and the progeny, occasionally produced fruiting offspring. Importantly, this result offered a possibility that interspecific crosses could produce vines with the greater disease tolerance of the American parent and possibly the fruit and subsequent wine qualities of the vinifera parent in a single cultivar. If there was also phylloxera tolerance, the result could be a non-grafted, European attitudes about French hybrids According to Wagner (1955), French hybrids were always grown for vin de table or vin de pays and never suggested for "quality wine." However, there was one unintended but significant result of the interspecific crossing, especially with V. riparia, and that was improved cold hardiness of the subsequent Vitis selections. This enhanced characteristic, along with the earlier improved resistance to fungal diseases and phylloxera, now OneStepAd_01-09-12_Layout 1 1/9/12 10:14 PM Page 1 TERROIR: Good For Grapes, Not For Glass Every winemaker knows that the best wine starts with the cleanest equipment and bottles. Straight-A and One Step are ecologically formulated to provide the best and safest cleaning results. Taste the Wine not the Grime One Step for easy, single-step cleansing Straight-A for heavy-duty cleaning Clearly Perfect www.ecologiccleansers.com Win es & Vin es JA N UA RY 20 14 139