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Wine-Grower-News #95 July 31, 2009 (Next Newsletter in One Week!)

Midwest Grape & Wine Industry Institute: http://www.extension.iastate.edu/Wine

Information in this issue includes:

Iowa vine/wine industry display at the Iowa State Fair?The House of Mondavi – Book ReviewISU Organic Agriculture Program working with Snus Hill WineryEastern Iowa Amateur Wine Competition Breaks Century MarkAssorted “Lodi” Pictures from My Recent California TripShow n Tell (Train Wreck Vineyard)Comments from ReadersQuote of the WeekArticles of InterestNeeto-Keeno WWW Stuff

Iowa vine/wine industry display at the Iowa State Fair?

Last week I sent out an e-mail request for volunteers to help out at the “NEW” Iowa vineyard and winery display that the State Fair board is running at Grandfather’s Barn on the top of the hill at the State Fair. The response has been good, though we still have about 50% of the time slots yet to fill. Several people e-mailed me confusing this display with the Wine & Cheese Tent located in the food vendor area of the fair. These are completely different and separate from each other. The Wine & Cheese Tent is a private operation owned by Kevin & Janey Smith of Turkey Time Concessions to help promote Iowa wines and share some of the revenue with the Iowa Wine Growers Association. Kevin is also a board member of the Iowa Wine Growers Association.

The Iowa vineyard and winery display being put together at Grandfather’s Barn is the result of Kevin Smith’s efforts to convince the State Fair Board to consider a permanent a vineyard and winery industry display at the barn site. The Fair Board agreed unanimously last summer to support this effort. So far, Kevin Smith, Randall Vos (DMACC) and myself have been working with the State Fair staff to help make this happen. Barb Rasko (MakeMineWine Magazine) agreed to be the barn superintendent two weeks ago. Ackerman Winery in Amana, Iowa and Baxter’s Winery in Nauvoo, Illinois have donated antique winery items for the display. Stan Olson, of Penoach Vineyard, Nursery and Winery donated the grape plants for the display vineyard.http://www.penoach.com/

Some of the features that will be included with this year’s vine/wine display will be:

1. Grape stomping contest each day. 2. Special topic speakers each day. 3. Restored Lewis Clipper grape havester and hydraulic grape trailer provided by Fred and

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Cindy Ver Schuure of Oskaloosa. 4. Poster displays. 5. Antique wooden basket press. 6. Antique redwood primary fermentation barrel. 7. Antique 3,000 gallon barrel head mounted on the wall of the barn. 8. Wine tasting & wine sales. 9. Video screen displays. 10. Demonstration vineyard. 11. Iowa Wine and Beer Promotion brochures. 12. Miscellaneous handout materials. 13. Commercial Wine Competition.

I see this as a HUGE opportunity to help promote our Iowa wine industry to the 1 million+ people from around the world who attend this event. I want to thank the State Fair Board for putting their resources behind this display.

Iowa State Fair, August 13 – 23, 2009: http://www.iowastatefair.org/

(Above) 7-30-09-MartyMohrfeld (small vineyard just east of the Iowa State Fair grounds) helped me put together the antique redwood primary fermentation tank and antique basket press for the display at Grandfather’s Barn. Both the tank and press were provided by Baxter’s Winery in Nauvoo, Illinois: http://www.nauvoowinery.com/

The House of Mondavi – Book Review

I just finished reading The House of Mondavi – The RISE and FALL of an American Wine Dynasty by Julia Flynn Siler and published by Gotham Books. The hardcopy version came out in 2007. I purchased the paperback which was released in May of 2008. This 452 page paperback shows a U.S price of $15 on the cover. I noticed that Amazon.com was selling the new paperback version for $10.20 and the hardcopy for $20.00.

Once I started reading this book, I could not set it down. (This does not happen very often.) Anyone with any interest at all in the wine industry will be fascinated by each page of this book. This

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narrative chronicles the life of 4 generations of the Mondavi family from 1883 in a small town of Sassoferrato, Italy and then onto the demiseof the Mondavi empire on November 4, 2004 whenConstellation Brands purchased the Mondavi businessfor $1.35 billion. It is also a story of how the wineindustry grew in the U.S., the world, California andespecially Napa Valley.

The real story behind the 452 pages of words in this book is a story of how hard work, intense ambition, greed and family infighting can destroy a family, a business and a way of life. This New York Times BestSeller will OPENyour EYES as to how cut-throat the wine industry can be. The details in this book are backed up by 525 hours ofinterviews with 250 different people and 36 pages of exhaustive notes listed at the end of the book to verify the facts.

I feel that this is a MUST READ for anyone in the wine industry and belongs on the shelf with your other technical winery and vineyard books.

Note: Robert Mondavi died on May 16, 2008 at the age of 94.

ISU Organic Agriculture Program working with Snus Hill Winery

Vivian Bernau, Sophomore in Horticulture and Agronomy is working with Dr. Kathleen Delate, ISU Extension Organic Specialist this season to test two organic-compliantherbicides: All-Down (vinegar based) and Green Match(essential-oil based) as spot treatments for weeds thatemerge through a hardwood mulch applied 8 inches deep and 1 meter in diameter around each grape vine. One vine per row has only mulch and is used as the control. Dr. Delate tells me that there is a big difference! The organic-compliant herbicides seem to be working.

We want to thank Snus Hill Winery for partnering with ISU on this project.

(Right) Vivian Bernau checks mulch level around eachgrape plant at Snus Hill Winery, Madrid, Iowa:http://www.snushillwine.com/

ISU Extension Organic Agriculture Program:http://extension.agron.iastate.edu/organicag/

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Eastern Iowa Amateur Wine Competition Breaks Century Mark

114 Midwestern Wines Battle for Top Honors

(Vinton, IA) The 2nd annual Eastern Iowa Amateur Wine Competition was a tremendous success with 114 wine entries! Wines from across the region, as far awayas Minneapolis, MN and Coin, IA (southwest corner) werereceived and evaluated by a team of four skilled judges: Matt Braafhart (Des Moines), Ken Groninga (owner/winemaker: (Eagle City Winery), Eric Rosenquist (owner:Wine Intelligence), and Zach Bott (winemaker: Fireside Winery). (Above) Matt Hass (R) & Martin Blind

After five hours of critical evaluation the judges were able to select the best of the best! Top honors were swept by Matt Haas (Dubuque) with his native/hybrid wines: Best of Show – LaCrescent (sweet); three, double gold medals for: Vidal Blanc, a sweet ice-style wine; and two dry, native /hybrid white wines: Seyval Blanc, and a LaCrosse/St. Pepin blend. Martin Blind (Vinton) also took top honors with his Orange- Chocolate Port. Event organizers created a new category and trophy (“The Fochy”) for the best Foch wine in an attempt to elevate the Marechal Foch grape. The winner of the first annual “Fochy” trophy went to Brad Ross (Vinton) for his Blush-Foch. (Above) Brett Schminke

After judging, visitors were able to sample and vote for their favorite People’s Choice award. This year, Brett Schminke (Shellsburg) took honors with his sweetSpiced-Apple wine.

The full list of winners can be found at:http://www.iowawineclub.org/results09.html

Plans are already underway to improve and expand thefast-growing Midwestern amateur winemaking competition for 2010. Contact Martin Blind at (319-551-2075) or visitthe Eastern Iowa Wine Club at www.iowawineclub.orgfor additional information.

(Right) Sandy & Brad Ross

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Assorted “Lodi” Pictures from My Recent California Trip

This is #3 in a series of reports from a trip I made to Davis, California to attend an International Conference entitled, “ Recent Advances in Grapevine Canopy Management” held at UC Davis in California on 7-16-09. This week will be a review of my visit to the Lodi, California winegrape region. The town of Lodi is located approximately 35 miles south of Sacramento and 90 miles east of San Francisco. There are over 70 wineries in this area.

Larry Pilmaier invited me down to Lodi, California to visit Woodbridge Winery. Larry is an Iowa boy who went West. He has been the Woodbridge Winery Visitor Center Manager for the past nine years. He also planted 800 Frontenac vines on his parents place on the north side of Des Moines in 2006.

(Above) Lodi Wine Trail sign. There are 36 wineries on this trail. (Above) Vineyards cover the Lodi region similar

to corn and soybeans cover Iowa. Many of the vineyard owners have planted rose bushes at the end posts along the roads. A practice dating back to the late 1800’s when vineyard owners in France would spray their grapes with a copper sulfate and hydrated lime mixture to keep people from pilfering grapes. Professor Pierre Millardet recognized that this “Bordeaux” Mixture (1885) was also controlling some bacterial and fungus diseases. Rose bushes were then planted on the end rows as an indicator plant to help determine the timing of the Bordeaux Mixture to the plants. They would start spraying when diseases started to show up on the roses. This technique is no longer used, but it does make for a good tasting room story. Bordeaux Mixture:http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn7481.html

(Below) Sign in front of the Lodi Wine Visitors Center located in the town of Lodi. The tasting room inside this center boasts over 200+ of the local wines.http://www.lodiwine.com/

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Woodbridge Winery is one of the largest wineries in California. The winery was first established by Robert Mondavi in 1979. Lodi was the childhood home of Robert Mondavi. The winery and visitor center is open seven days per week, except for some select holidays. Free public winery tours are given at 9:30 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. each day. Here are some photos from Woodbridge winery. http://www.woodbridgewines.com/

(Left) Sugar Stand – This is where 130 - 25 ton truck loads of grapes will pass through each day before being received at the winery. Government inspectors sample each load of grapes for quality factors.

(Above) Larry Pilmaier pours some greatCabernet through a “Vinturi” device that spins and aerates the wine. Larry uses it while pouring all their dry red wines. They sell this device in their gift shop. http://www.vinturi.com/

(Above) Woodbridge Winery has the capacity to store 55 million gallons of wine at one time. This single tank holds 216,830 gallons. Iowa wineries produced 283,000 gallons in 2008!

(Right) This is where the white grapes are received. They immediately go to one of 8-25 ton membrane presses. Woodbridge Winery purchases grapes from approximately 300 growers in the area.

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(Left) 25 ton loads of red grapes are unloadedinto this crusher destemmer.

(Above) Woodbridge bottling line. It was bottling 700 - 1.5 liter bottles/minute when I was there. It is the fastest 1.5 liter bottling line in the world.

(Above) Shiraz grapes growing at Woodbridge. They were just beginning to change color (veraison) on 7-15-09.They expected grape harvest to start on August 6, 2009 around Woodbridge.

(Above) Woodbridge barrel filling room. Each barrel holds 59 gallons. The 60,000+ barrels in storage are held at 55-60°F.

(Above) Larry Pilmaier standing in the original Mondavi redwood tank room filled with approximately 20+ tanks in the 5-30,000 gallon range. These tanks are original to the winery, built in 1933.

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I had just enough time to stop at one other winery in the Lodi area, Heritage Oak winery. This winery is located approximately 2 miles east of the Woodbridge winery. It is owned and operated by Tom and Carmela Hoffman, with the occasional help from their sons Mathew and Robert. Tom’s family has operated the farm this winery sits on for almost 150 years. I stopped here because I met Mathew this winter at ISU where he has recently completed his Masters degree in Rural Sociology and Sustainable Agriculture. He will be attending UC Davis this fall to begin working on his PhD degree with an emphasis in sociology in the wine industry. This is a very unique family and winery. It is worth visiting their WWW site to learn more about them. Some of the unique things they offer at their winery include:

- A hiking trail where people can purchase a bottle of wine and picnic basket and walk down to the sandbar on the Mokelumne River. Hikers are required to read and sign a Property Use Agreement before they start hiking. There is nothing in this agreement that requires people to keep their clothes on. Something I realized after startling a young couple near the river!

- Tom Hoffman is somewhat of the Bird and Bat Man of the California vineyard industry. It was he who started putting up barn owl boxes, bat boxes and assorted bird boxes in his vineyards. He now has a company called Bio-Diversity Products were you can purchase these items. http://tommy51.tripod.com/products.html

- Wild blackberry bushes border all along the Mokelumne River on the Heritage Oak property. People can come down in July and pick black berries while hiking.

- Tom’s wife Carmela has established a hummingbird sanctuary in and around their outside winery patio. So many hummingbirds that the winery will host a hummingbird patio event every other Friday evening during the summer. Carmela serves wine, Tom plays a Baby Grand Piano and people watch the hummingbirds.

Note: These are all examples of what can also be done here in Iowa.

I would highly recommend you stopping by the Heritage Oak Winery if you have a chance. Good wine, good people and good place! Links of interest:

(Left) Heritage Oak Winery: http://www.heritageoakwinery.comHeritage Oak Winery Blog: http://heritageoakwinery.wordpress.com/

(Right) Mathew Hoffman (L) and Tom Hoffman behind Heritage Oak Tasting room bar.

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Show n Tell (Train Wreck Vineyard)

(Left) Hummingbird at feeder located above the Heritage Oak winery patio area.

(Above) 7-31-09 Steve Larson standing inTrain Wreck Vineyard located just south of Livermore, IA. Approx. 1 acre vineyard planted primarily to Marquette, Brianna, and Frontenac Gris in 2008. Steve’s wife Jeanalong with Dallas & Karen Clark are all partners in this endeavor. Steve (the winemaker) hopes to open a winery in the near future.

(Above) Remains of the M & SL Railroad “Bloody Run Bridge” located on the southwest corner of Train Wreck Vineyard. This 200 foot long bridge was the scene of a deadly train wreck that occurred on 7-2-1924. The train composed of an engine, tender, 3 coaches and 2 mail/baggage cars fell to the ground as the bridge collapsed. Eight of the 70 people aboard died instantly as the train crashed into Lotts Creek. Thirty additional people were injured, some critically.

(Left) 7-24-09 scene of the Bloody Run Train wreck. Taken from:http://www.livermoreiowa.org/LivermoreHistory.htm

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Comments from Readers

“Hi Mike,

We finished our 2nd annual Eastern Iowa Amateur Wine Competition last Thursday and had 114 entries! With four experienced wine judges on hand our local CBS affiliate KGAN visited to talk about the new AVA and our competition. Click here to see:”

http://www.kgan.com/shared/newsroom/top_stories/videos/kgan_vid_717.shtml

--- Brad Johnson, Secretary – Eastern Iowa Wine Club http://www.iowawineclub.org/

Quotes of the Week

“To succeed and have a happy life, you need common sense, a commitment to hard work and the courage to go your own way.”

--- Robert Mondavi

“How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood!”

--- obviously someone with too much time on their hands!

Articles of Interest

1. Pennsylvania Plans Wine Kiosks, 7-27-09, Beverage World. The Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board plans to put 100 wine vending machines in Harrisburg area grocery stores for a trial run. Each vending machine will be 10’ high and 25’ long and hold about 200 bottles of wine. Customers will insert their drivers license in one slot and blow into another. An electronic video camera will be used for identification. Read the entire article here: http://www.beverageworld.com/content/view/36542/

2. Japanese Beetles Expanding Range in Iowa, 7-28-09, ISU IPM News. Corn and soybean folksare also having problems with Japanese Beetles in Iowa: http://www.extension.iastate.edu/CropNews/2009/0727hodgson.htm

3. Iowa in Wine Country? Feds say yes, 7-21-09, Omaha World Herald:http://www.omaha.com/article/20090721/MONEY/707219875

Neeto-Keeno WWW Stuff

1. Local Wine Events.com - Worlds largest food & drink calendar, where all the worlds food, wine, beer and spirit events are listed in one place. Free posting available: http://www.localwineevents.com/

2. Clear Lake Iowa, Harvest Festival, Saturday, Oct. 3rd, 2009:

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http://www.clearlakeiowa.com/clear_lake_harvest_festival.shtml

3. New Iowa Publication on Protecting Bees Complements New National Web Resource http://www.extension.iastate.edu/news/2009/jul/113001.htm Iowa’s bee colony losses between September 2008 and April 2009 were 63.9 percent. This ISU Extension publication helps beekeepers and pesticide applicators understand their roles to protect pollinators.

4. Lodi Amateur Wine Vintners Association: http://www.lodiamateurvintners.org/

Post & View Classified Ads here: http://iowawinegrowers.org

Past issues archived as html and/or pdf here:

http://www.extension.iastate.edu/Wine/Resources/winegrowernews.htm

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Michael L. White, ISU Extension Viticulture Specialist

909 East 2nd St. Suite E, Indianola, IA 50125-2892ph: 515-961-6237, fax: 6017 or mlwhite@iastate.edu

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