Document text
Looks like vintage year for grapes Mail Tribune photo/Steven Johnson Del Rio�s chardonnay grapes will be shipped to wineries in Portland and the Willamette Valley. Newly converted vineyard, others benefit from ideal summer By Bill Kettler GOLD HILL � The pears are gone, but the grapes are coming on. Del Rio Vineyard�s first grapes are ripening under gentle autumn sunshine. Pears and peaches grew on the land for the 90 years it was known as Del Rio Orchards. New owners converted the land to viticulture in 1998. The young vines are skinny, but they set enough fruit in their second summer to make a harvest. Pickers scurry through long rows of vines each morning, snipping grape clusters before they warm in the heat of the day. "We try to pick them cool," says vineyard manager Rob Wallace. "It�s a six-hour trip to the Columbia River." Like many Southern Oregon vineyards, Del Rio has sold part of its harvest to wineries in Portland and the Willamette Valley. The grapes fare better on the road if they start their trip cool. Del Rio started harvesting a week earlier than many Southern Oregon vineyards. The vineyard�s south-facing slopes collected summer�s heat in the dry soil, and the heat in the soil pushed the grapes to ripen a week or two earlier than most other sites in Jackson and Josephine counties. "I don�t know anybody else who�s harvesting their reds yet," says Sherman Lamb, who grows 21 acres of grapes at Aguila Vineyard near Talent. Lamb says this year�s warm, dry summer provided ideal grape-growing conditions across Southern Oregon. "The grapes look beautiful," he says. "We don�t know what kind of wine we�re going to have, but it�s shaping up to be a spectacular year." Lamb says summer�s consistently warm days will hasten the harvest by a week or more at many Rogue Valley vineyards this fall. If the warm, dry weather continues, a harvest season that typically spreads across four or five weeks could be compressed into just two or three weeks. "It makes things a little more hectic," he says, "but it makes things end quicker, too." An early harvest could shorten the time growers spend worrying about rain and frost, says Don Moore, whose Griffin Creek wines have earned a reputation far beyond the Rogue Valley. Rain promotes mildew that could ruin the grapes, and frost kills the leaves on the vine. Without leaves, photosynthesis stops before the grapes collect all the sugars they need to make great wine. "Up north, they sweat bullets sometimes," Moore says. "They have wet summers and early frosts." Del Rio will harvest fewer grapes per acre than many vineyards, because the vines are still young � their trunks are barely a half-inch thick. Workers removed 20 to 50 percent of the grape clusters on the young vines to concentrate the wine-making sugars into relatively few clusters of fruit. "If you hang too much fruit, you�re not going to have the quality," Wallace says, "and quality is what it�s all about." Del Rio�s 180 acres make it the biggest vineyard in Jackson and Josephine counties. Wine grapes now cover about 1,500 acres in the two-county region, which has earned its own "appellation" to set it apart as a distinct wine region. Interest in viticulture continues to grow, says Porter Lombard, a retired Medford horticulturist who has helped several grape growers organize their vineyards. Lombard says he�s received inquiries from 15 or 20 people recently about starting their own operations, adding, "We keep hearing there�s some big outfits from California that are interested." Lombard says all the signs point to good yields and flavorful grapes, but the final judgment on the 2000 vintage can�t be made until the wine is ready to drink. "You never know," he says, "until you get it in the bottle. Mail Tribune Home | Ottaway Newspapers, Inc. | Dow Jones & Co., Inc. | Privacy | Contact Us Copyright � 2000 Mail Tribune, Inc.