Page 38 - Grapevine March-April 2020

Around The Vineyard

Mechanized Farming Pushes

Canopy Management Evolution

By: Gerald Dlubala
F rom pruning, shoot thinning and positioning, Management in Healdsburg, California. “We’ve

come a long way in the past 30 years from when
leaf and lateral care to hands-on vine train-
ing, canopy management is the best way for
a vineyard to achieve optimal, mature fruit from it was fashionable just to have the California flop,
meaning the grapes were grown-up vertically, and
their vines. Good canopy management, partnered the canopy was left to flop over. When increased
with the proper trellis and row spacing, allows vine- production was needed, and European varieties
yards to better combat fruit loss due to disease or were introduced, it became apparent that we need-
pest damage while providing an overall protective ed to provide better light and greater air circulation
and nurturing environment. for the fruit. Around the 1980s came the push to
reduce or eliminate bunch rot and mold, and after
Canopy Management Is a particularly wet season, the practice of leafing
An Evolving Science began. Then around the mid-1980s, Dr. Richard
Smart, an Australian viticulturist, revolutionized our
“It’s always been evolving, but it seems to be way of grape growing with his Smart-Dyson trellis
moving along at a more deliberate pace now,” said system.”
Duff Bevill, founder and partner of Bevill Vineyard

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