Choosing a Place to Plant

You've decided you want to plant some grapes to make your own wine. So, you go about your business and buy some seedlings and go about to plant your own grapevines. You pick your favorite grape, you plant, and you expect to have thriving grapevines that you will harvest come the early fall and you will make them into wine. 

Simple? Huh? Your wine will be great, you just know it because how hard can it be to ferment and blend once you've finished the hard part: growing.

And, yes, you probably can grow grapes. Some of them are extremely hardy. They might even taste pretty good. But, what it is much less likely that you can do is produce great grapes of the type that make wine.

If you've been a regular reader, you'll recall some of the things we've discussed over time. We've talked about hillsides and elevation and sun exposure and proximity to water and diurnal temperature change and soil differences and richness of soil. We've also talked about some grapes that are susceptible to mold and to powdery mildew and downy mildew. We've talked about that nasty little mite, phylloxera, and what it can do to grapes and that some rootstock is phylloxera-resistant while others are quite susceptible.

There is so much to know and while I have written about a lot of it, in my case, it's simply book knowledge, or perhaps in my case, better said as head knowledge. That is, since I write off the top of my head, it's stuff that is stuck in there that either I read somewhere, heard somewhere else, or simply divined (that's not quite a fancy term for saying I made it up because honestly, I make up exrremely little in here).

So, I certainly encourage you to take a plot of land and to grow grapes on it. But, as much as choosing the right place, perhaps more importantly, choose the right grapes. Just because you love Chardonnay doesn't mean you can grow good Chardonnay where I live with the hot humid summers. Pinot Noir will not like to wake up to 80F/27C mornings with intense sunlight early in the day.

On the other hand, if you live near water where it is a bit cooler, those Burgundian grapes might be much happier. You'll tend to get morning fog. And, if you plant your grapes so that they get predominantly afternoon sunlight, they might be happy.

How much rain do you get in your area during growing season? Does it tend to be heavy or is it nice and about a tenth of an inch per day (one quarter of a centimeter). If it's dryer, how will you keep your grapes irrigated? Can the grapes get water from the ground? How deep will the roots need to dig? DO they have that much access? Or, like in much of this area, will the roots be trying to penetrate solid granite?

So many decisions.

So, between that and the proverbial black thumb, I buy my wine rather than planting my own grapes to make it.