Ontario's first organic winery

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Summer in the vineyard is a busy time!

There is sowing cover crops between vine rows, weeding/hoeing, tucking, hedging, sucker pulling, leaf pulling and being watchful for pests and disease.

Thank goodness our vineyard hand, Huang, is an expert and patiently tends our 30 acres of vines. Huang is one of the many Vietnamese Boat People who settled in Hamilton and St.Catharines. Their work in Niagara’s vineyards is extremely valued. Hardworking and deft, teams of Vietnamese-Canadians perform a variety of the above mentioned tedious, manual tasks.

So, why are these tasks necessary?

Well, the answer to that is the very nature of grapevines. They have a tendency to grow and grow, and soon outgrow their trellising systems. Their skyward growth habit is called apical dominance. Therefore, the tasks of hedging, tucking, removing suckers and pulling leaves covering the fruiting zone is all about managing this vigorous canopy.

Each task has a seasonal time frame and benefits the grapevine in a particular way.

Let’s take a look.

Sowing cover crops between rows of vines:
Having ground cover between rows of grapevines has several benefits, such as, preventing soil erosion and soil compaction, improving water penetration, increasing organic matter for the soil, fixing nitrogen in the soil, providing a habitat for beneficial insects (who control the bad bugs), discouraging weeds, and lowering vine vigour (remember we do not want the vines to grow tall but to put their energy into fruit production). At Frogpond, we plant flowering legumes and mustards.

Weeding and hoeing are ongoing tasks during the growing season. As anyone who tends a garden or a lawn can attest, weeds are a pesky problem. So keeping the area below the canopy and around the trunk free of weeds is important. Weeds compete for moisture and nutrients with grapevines. Removing weeds also improves air circulation, reduces cover for rodents, reduces competition for sunlight and allows more efficient harvesting. At Frogpond we use a grape hoe attached to our tractor.

Removing suckers which are lateral growth or adventitious shoots found near or below the ground is another important vineyard task. Suckers use up a lot of food reserves from the vine. We usually remove them by hand while weeding or tucking.

Tucking and hedging usually occur in late July when grapevines have grown and flopped over their trellising. Hedging means removing excess primary and lateral shoot growth from the top and sides of the canopy. The idea behind hedging, beyond having very tidy looking vineyard rows, is the potential impact on better fruit quality (whereby the vine can dedicate more nutrients to fruit production versus growing skyward). Improved air circulation (which reduces powdery and downy mildew issues) and better sun exposure are more more positive impacts. Tucking refers to taking the shoots protruding into the row and lifting or “tucking” them between the sets of guide-wires of the trellising system. Again the benefits include better air circulation and sunlight for the grape clusters as well as ease when harvesting. Our tractor has an attachment for hedging but tucking is done by hand.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Leaf pulling or leaf removal is done in and around the grape clusters to allow for increased sunlight exposure and airflow. The aim is not to remove all the foliage from around the fruiting zone. Some leaves must remain on the shoot to produce carbohydrates which support growth, fruit development and ripening as well as preventing sunburn. Our goal at Frogpond is to leave two leaf layers in the fruit zone after pulling and we only remove those leaves at or below fruit level.

Well, that’s what we do to maintain the vineyard during the summer. If you have time on your hands, you are welcome to come by and help.