Sucker Punch

Well Spring has made it's appearance at last. True signs that the vineyard is in full growth mode are the emerging "suckers" found at the base and all along the vine's trunk. These innocent looking leaves will feed off of the vine's energy "sucking" the life from the rest of the buds that we need to produce fruit clusters later in the year. This year's rains will no likely lead to a few million of these fellows springing up everywhere denoting the vigor that can occur with a wet vineyard floor. So what to do?

Get rid of them before they become hardened stems. By just running the palm of your hand down the trunk of the vine at this time, they will easily fall off. We will allow them to grow a bit before removing them just to let the vine blow off a little steam so that the vines will not exert new excessive energy into the upper shoot growth for the rest of spring. It is all a matter of timing and balance. When to slow down the vine and when to knudge the growth in the right direction. This year should be a challenge.


Along with the suckers, it is time to mow the cover crop. We've kept the weedy looking wild radish, clovers and natural cover crop for awhile longer than we'd normally like, just to soak up some of the extra moisture from the unusually wet soil. This too will help us balance the vine growth for a bit. But not for long, although frost is rarely a worry for our hillside vineyard, the high weeds will lower the temperature near the new shoots to that of near ground level temps. So Tom's off to mow this week, still a little tricky to drive the ATV and mowing unit through the soft wet vineyard, but it has to be done and he's the designated driver this time.