Growing Degree Days

This time of year, I like to obsess about the last spring frost. March was very warm this year, and many of the vines have buds that are unfolding. I would prefer that it be much later. Many data sources for the area show the average last spring frost date to be April 20th, and the first killing fall frost to be Oct 20th. The weather channel website has recently added a neat page that calculates growing degree days for a zipcode. Here’s the data for the past few years for my location, using April 20th to Oct 20th as the growing season. This is a bit of an approximation. The real GDD count is for the frost dates for that particular year, not the average.

• 2009 2667
• 2008 2778
• 2007 3187
• 2006 2670
• 2005 3275
• 2004 2868
• 2003 2729
• Avg 2659

The Avg number listed is based on a 30 year figure. I’m not sure if the data is specifically from my area or if it is aggregate data from the region.

Winter 2009

While most people in the area think that the winter was rough, it was a mild one for grapes for a change. Minimum winter temperature measured at the house was -1.8 F. There’s still a good bit of snow on the ground which is rapidly melting. The spring equinox is just under two weeks away, with the 10 day forecast showing lows near freezing. Anything can happen, but the odds are looking good that this will have been a mild winter.

Some of the vines that did not make it last year are on order to be replaced. Of course, this usually means that some that I thought were dead will start growing again. The next big event will be the last frost of spring, and then budbreak ( and hopefully in that order!).

Spring 09

This spring has been very cool, delaying budbreak to much later than usual. For our area, this is a good thing, since it reduces the chance of damage due to a late spring frost. The average last frost date is around April 25th, with the latest recorded frost date being May 30th. Most people in the area do not plant their gardens until Memorial Day. With the potential for a late spring frost, pruning decisions become a bit more complicated. I usually prune half of the buds that I intend to, and then sometime towards the middle of May, when the 10 day forecast shows temps well above freezing, prune the rest.

This year, the backyard vines were pruned almost completely back to the main trunks, in an attempt to control some of the black rot from last year. It may be a lost cause. The last of the cabernet sauvignon vines in the back yard did not survive the winter. The graft union was completely rotten. There is one guwerztraminer vine, five cabernet franc and five Riesling vines left.

Last year’s planting appears to have progressed fairly well. There are some vines that are growing extremely fast, and others that are growing much slower. Several of the Landot Noir did not survive the drought at the end of last year. While most of them show no signs of growth, a few vines that appeared to be dead last year are sprouting some leaves. There was one casualty on each of the other rows as well. Some of the vines already have buds on them, which were pinched off. Pictures to follow.

Winter Hardiness 2008

Looks like we may have had the worst of the winter cold for this season, although it is usually too soon to call until after the middle of February. Jan 16th, the low was -11 F. The temperature dropped from sundown to about 11 pm, and started heading back up, so it does not look like it held that low for more than a few hours. In the past, there were two back to back years where the mimnum temp was -12F. The temperature is collected at the house and not at the vineyard, which could result in higher or lower temperatures. Most of the parts are in place to get the remote temperature sensors in place, it just has not happened yet.

More Mowing

The clover cover crop has really delivered on the low growing promise, and it’s been a month between mowings so far. It has also been really dry, which would have been fantastic for the grapes if they were producing fruit this year. There was no irrigation in place for the new vines, which in hindsight was probably a mistake. Luckily, the first half of the growing season was very wet, and only now do they need some water.

Second mowing August 08

The trellis end braces were finally put in, and the first wire was put up. If I do this again, I will plan to have the trellis ready to go up the day after planting.

End braces in place

The front yard Foch is nearly ready to be picked. The forecast calls for no rain until Saturday when some hurricane remnants move into the area. Thursday looks like a good picking day.

08 Foch

Keeping the cover crop and associated weeds cut has always been somewhat of a problem. The right tool for the job is probably a high quality sub compact tractor with a mid-mount mower, and a sturdy transmission (with limited slip) to handle turning at the bottom where the grade starts to be an issue. But this sort of tractor has a price tag near the 5 digit range. Mowing with the brush hog and the big tractor does work, but it takes a lot of time to negotiate the turns, especially when the front loader is still attached. I finally decided on a Sears Craftsman mower, with a 42″ deck. The smaller deck means I can get it into the bed of the truck. Buying the Craftsman means that I’ll eventually end up with some longevity and reliability issues, but there are plenty of places to get parts, and they are not terribly hard to work on. I also got the grass catcher for it, which has to be one of the best designed and well made grass catchers I have seen. The “full bag” indicator is not well designed and does not give a definitive measure of whether or not the bags are full. But it’s pretty easy to reach around, pat the second bag and get a sense for how loaded it is. The downsides to this mower are that it is way too light, and has difficulty turning on even the slightest grade or slightest uneven terrain. I did get the wheel weights after the fact, so hopefully they will help. The standard tires are the common Turf Saver tires, which are great for someone’s front lawn, but pretty much useless for this application. Carlisle does make an ag tread for that size, so that will be on the todo list as well. The rear axle does not have a limited slip differential, which appears to be mandatory. The rare tires could have also been bigger. The MTS 5500 series has larger tires, but was not available with a smaller deck. I went with the hydrostatic transmission, and I can see why people do not like to use it on slopes. However, with a bit of tweaking of the transmission lever, it will go down a hill at a nice slow pace without having to keep the foot on the brake. You just have to plan ahead for changing from downhill to uphill. What did amaze me though was the smoothness and quality of the cut. This was also obvious in my yard at home. The quality of the pictures probably leaves a lot to be desired, but the vineyard looks like a lawn, and not a field.

This weekend, the vine shelters came off, and the new growth was tied up to the bamboo stakes. Halfway through, I ran out of tape for the Ty’mup taper. The Landot Noir showed signs of water stress, and maybe it’s a combination of the vine type. There are around a dozen vines that look like they may not make it to next spring. But I’ve been wrong before. I had a Cabernet Franc vine in the back yard that looked dead, so I mowed over it with the lawn mower. Next spring, it sprouted, and the vine is doing just fine now. One Frontenac and one traminette vine had a single cluster on it. The Traminette flavor was excellent, and was sweet, even though it seemed early for it to be ripe. The Frontenac had a nice cherry flavor. It will be exciting to see how this progresses into winemaking in a few years.

First Mowing

The winter rye took off since planting day. By the end of June, much of the rye was well over 4 ft tall. My brother-in-law ran a brush hog through the center aisles, but there was still a lot of cleanup to do. With a hoe, a weed trimmer, a regular lawn mower, and 3 people, it took several hours to get it all done. It might be time for a garden tractor. Maneuvering a 50 hp tractor with a brush hog on it through the vineyard was not easy.

Almost all of the grape vines are up. Last count was 144 out of 145. Many of the vines have grown out of the shelter, and the trellis work needs to be completed really soon (like last week).

This picture is from June 28th.

Vineyard after mowing

Almost time to mow

The month of May has been cold and wet so far. I have not tracked the growing degree days, but I am guessing that there has been very little heat accumulation so far. But the wet weather with the cloudy days has kicked the cover crop into full swing. Some of the clover is starting to bloom, and the winter rye is now finally growing like I had hoped it would do last fall.

The vines are growing too. I was worried that there would be some catastrophic failure because of the week long delay, and also because the planting day was so dry and windy. I walked each row, and counted the vines that had visible leaves, not just buds. There were some vines that had new bud growth, but no leaves yet. I’ll count them when they finally open. The totals were as follows:

• Neptune 25/28
• Vignoles/101-14 16/28
• Landot Noir 12/28
• Traminette/101-14 15/21
• Frontenac Gris 15/21
• Frontenac 15/20

The grafted vines seem to take a good bit of time to get started. Some of the vines look completely dead. However, based on past experience with the vines in the backyard, just give them time. I had traminette vines that looked dead from April to May, and then in June, they started to sprout.

Planting pictures

Thanks to Brad for taking some photos during the day.

The vine shelters are the Snap-Max brand, 30 inches tall. The 36 inch shelters were sold out. The Snap-Max was purchased from Spec Trellising. It’s a shame they don’t have online ordering. You have to call their 800 number, and then wait for someone to help you. Would be so much easier for everyone involved if they had pricing and online web ordering available.

Around lunch time, the first row was done, and the second row was about halfway finished. Lunch consisted of sandwiches and some delicious chili that Sarah made.

The crew gets back to work after lunch.

Danny and I planting the second row.

Deb and Beth are planting the third row.

For once, I am outstanding in my field. So is Danny.

The crew is busy digging holes before the next rain storm rolls in.

In between rain storms, Brad got in a picture of the progress so far.

Planting Complete

Today, the vines went in. The number of people and the time which they showed up turned out to be perfect. We finished planting the vines at 5 pm. It’s almost like we knew what we were doing. I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all those who showed up and helped. This could not have happened without them.

• Bryan and Deb
• Brad
• Danny
• Charles
• Karen and the kids
• Ron, Beth and Christian
• Nathan
• TJ

There are two people who come and help on the property every Saturday, my brother-in-law and my father-in-law, Justin and Howard. I would not be able to get any of this even close to ready to be done without them.

Behind the scenes are our wives, Nancy, Marianne, and Sarah, who are either bringing us food or watching the kids so that we have time to get this done.

I’ll take full credit for the idea to put a vineyard in, but it was not possible without all of the help.

Brad has some pictures that I will post next week.

Planting Day Weather

The forecast for Saturday is “isolated” thunderstorms. In the early morning, the chance of rain is under 20%, but as the afternoon approaches, the chance of rain goes up a good bit. As is typical in southwestern PA, “isolated” really does mean isolated. It might rain all day on the vineyard, but not at the house. Or it might not rain at all at the vineyard. It also might be raining on one part of the property and not the other. Of course, the weather forecast, similar to an economic forecast or the ancient oracle at Delphi, is sufficiently vague so as to be “accurate” regardless of what the outcome may be.