Terroir 2006 banner
IVES 9 IVES Conference Series 9 International Terroir Conferences 9 Terroir 2006 9 Influence of vine water status (Terroir 2006) 9 Terroir and vine water relation effects on grape ripening and wine quality of Syrah/R99

Terroir and vine water relation effects on grape ripening and wine quality of Syrah/R99

Abstract

A Syrah/R99 vineyard in the Stellenbosch area was used. The vineyard is vertically trained and spaced 2.75 x 1.5 m in north-south orientated rows on terroir with Glenrosa soil and west-facing slope. Irrigation (to 100% field water capacity) treatments were applied at different development stages [all stages (including berry set stage); pea size; véraison; post-véraison]. Combined effects of water status and ripeness level were investigated. Preliminary results are presented. Irrigated and non-irrigated vines differed in terms of soil water status, particularly during ripening. Vine water status during late ripening stages varied according to timing of water supply. Secondary leaves seemed most sensitive to water stress, but essential to buffer extreme terroir conditions. Vines displayed independence of soil water during late ripening. Irrigation favoured berry mass stability. Sucrose flow to berries was restricted at the last ripeness level, indicated by increased concentrations in bunch rachis. This may serve as tool to determine a window for harvesting. The window from ripe to over-ripe grapes was reduced when vines were exposed to lower soil water levels. Similar anthocyanin patterns found with skin and whole berry extraction and reduced skin sucrose contents indicated disintegration, oxidation and respiration during the last ripeness level in skins. Treatments being deficit-managed for a longer period showed earlier maximum wine quality (ripeness level 1). Vines irrigated at all development stages and those irrigated at pea size stage, showed later maximum wine quality (ripeness level 2). Wine quality of all treatments was reduced at the third ripeness level. Pre- and post-véraison cultivating conditions seem to have a determining effect on grape ripening. Preliminary results showed that the ripening period may be extended and berry condition maintained for longer by improved vine water status on a specific terroir.

DOI:

Publication date: January 12, 2022

Issue: Terroir 2006

Type: Article

Authors

Jacobus J. HUNTER (1) and Alain DELOIRE (2)

(1) ARC Infruitec-Nietvoorbij, Private Bag X5026, 7599 Stellenbosch, South Africa
(2) Agro Montpellier, UMR 1083 « Sciences pour l’œnologie et la viticulture », 2 place Viala, 34060 Montpellier cedex 1, France

Contact the author

Keywords

terroir, water relations, canopy, grape ripening, wine quality

Tags

IVES Conference Series | Terroir 2006

Citation

Related articles…

Influence of weather and climatic conditions on the viticultural production in Croatia

The research includes an analysis of the impact of weather conditions on phenological development of the vine and grape quality, through monitoring of four experimental cultivars (Chardonnay, Graševina, Merlot and Plavac mali) over two production years. In each experimental vineyard, which were evenly distributed throughout the regions of Slavonia and The Croatian Danube, Croatian Uplands,

Comparison of imputation methods in long and varied phenological series. Application to the Conegliano dataset, including observations from 1964 over 400 grape varieties

A large varietal collection including over 1700 varieties was maintained in Conegliano, ITA, since the 1950s. Phenological data on a subset of 400 grape varieties including wine grapes, table grapes, and raisins were acquired at bud break, flowering, veraison, and ripening since 1964. Despite the efforts in maintaining and acquiring data over such an extensive collection, the data set has varying degrees of missing cases depending on the variety and the year. This is ubiquitous in phenology datasets with significant size and length. In this work, we evaluated four state-of-the-art methods to estimate missing values in this phenological series: k-Nearest Neighbour (kNN), Multivariate Imputation by Chained Equations (mice), MissForest, and Bidirectional Recurrent Imputation for Time Series (BRITS). For each phenological stage, we evaluated the performance of the methods in two ways. 1) On the full dataset, we randomly hold-out 10% of the true values for use as a test set and repeated the process 1000 times (Monte Carlo cross-validation). 2) On a reduced and almost complete subset of varieties, we varied the percentage of missing values from 10% to 70% by random deletion. In all cases, we evaluated the performance on the original values using normalized root mean squared error. For the full dataset we also obtained performance statistics by variety and by year. MissForest provided average errors of 17% (3 days) at budbreak, 14% (4 days) at flowering, 14.5% (7 days) at veraison, and 17% (3 days) at maturity. We completed the imputations of the Conegliano dataset, one of the world’s most extensive and varied phenological time series and a steppingstone for future climate change studies in grapes. The dataset is now ready for further analysis, and a rigorous evaluation of imputation errors is included.

Analysis of Cabernet Sauvignon and Aglianico winegrape (V. vinifera L.) responses to different pedo-climatic environments in southern Italy

Water deficit is one of the most important effects of climate change able to affect agricultural sectors. In general, it determines a reduction in biomass production, and for some plants, as in the case of grapevine, it can endorse fruit quality. The monitoring and management of plant water stress in the vineyard

Grape must quality and mesoclimatic variability in Fruška Gora wine-growing region, Serbia

The Fruška Gora mountain is a traditional wine-growing region in Serbia situated in the Pannonian Basin. Due to such a position, the vicinity of the Danube River and the presence of concave configuration, it is suitable for grape production. This paper provides analyses of spatial variations in meteorological parameters and grape juice quality within Fruška Gora wine region over three consecutive vintages (2018-2020). The examined period can be defined as warm with cool nights during September (AVG 18,9°C; GDD 1918°C; CI 12°CF) and with the presence of mesoclimatic variability. The East part of the study area was somewhat drier and hotter compared to other parts of the region. The analyses of grape must samples (190 in total) of five cultivars (Cabernet-Sauvignon, Merlot, Chardonnay, Sauvignon blanc and Grašac (Welschriesling)) commonly grown across the region (19 sites), were performed using Fourier Transform Infrared Technology (FTIR). Among all cultivars, Sauvignon blanc was harvested first in the East area (DOY=246±5, GDD at harvest=1552±74, 22.2±0.7 °Brix), while the latest harvest was recorded for Cabernet-Sauvignon in the West (DOY=283±5, GDD at harvest=1936±187, 23.4±1.0 °Brix ). Both the red and white cultivars had higher acidity and YAN in the grape must if the vines were grown in the North and East compared to South and West areas. According to PCA analysis, Grašac showed the lowest variation in grape must chemical composition. Thus, the results confirm that Grašac is the most stable cultivar in Fruška Gora. All monitored cultivars reached technological fruit ripeness by the end of the growing season. However, it was difficult to reach full ripeness of red cultivars, mostly beacuse of uncoupling of technolocical and phenolic ripeness. Thus, Cabernet-Sauvignon had higher variations in GDD sums at harvest compared to other cultivars, which probably increased variations in grape must quality.

Impact of climate change on the viticultural climate of the Protected Designation of Origin “Jumilla” (SE Spain)

Protected Designation of Origin “Jumilla” (PDO Jumilla) is located in the Spanish provinces of Albacete and Murcia, in the South-eastern part of the Iberian Peninsula, where most of the models predict a severe impact of climate change in next decades. PDO Jumilla covers an area of 247,054 hectares, of which more than 22,000 hectares