Oregon wine grape crop growth comes late with cool spring weather

Winemakers around the state are coping with another late growing season as persistently cool spring weather delays the growth of the grape crop, The Oregonian reported.

Oregon's $1.4 billion wine industry has grown to more than 400 commercial wineries where managers try to balance the effects of weather that can range from cool and wet to hot and dry in short order.

At Seven of Hearts winery in Carlton, owner Byron Dooley said the cool early spring has set him back about two weeks from where he would like to be. If he's jittery, it's because the conditions are reminiscent of last year, when only an extended burst of sun at harvest in early October saved a wholesale washout.

"I always remind myself that it's not what happens in June but what happens in October that's most crucial," Dooley said. "But 2010 was the most white-knuckled vintage I've been through. I would love not to have to do that all again."

A late start to the growing season makes it difficult to ever fully catch up. And when it does heat up under summer sunshine, unseasonable heat spikes can flood grapes with too much sugar, resulting in flabby, unbalanced wines.

If the harvest is delayed too long, autumn rains can threaten a crop that needs a long hanging time on the vine to develop the right mix of acids and sugars. The timing is always tricky, but key to any successful harvest, winemakers say.

"In my mind, wines from later vintages are always better than wines from earlier vintages," said Sam Tannahill, Oregon Wine Board chairman and a partner in Rex Hill Vineyards and A to Z Wineworks in Newberg. "Later vintages, of course, require longer hang time, which then introduces rain into the equation."

A couple of days of sunshine that recently broke through the otherwise gray days of the waning spring sparked activity at many vineyards. "We're seeing two to three inches growth on warm days right now," said Harry Peterson-Nedry, founder and winemaker at Chehalem winery in Newberg. "It's pretty stunning to watch."

Winemakers and vineyard managers around the state say they are feeling more optimistic than they were a few weeks ago. "We were saying, we're really late," said Mark Wisnovsky, an owner of Valley View Winery in Jacksonville. "Now, we're just late."