Viticultural characterisation of soils from triassic period at Beaumes-de-Venise (Côtes du Rhône, France)

The grape quality is affected by the canopy manipulation. Water management is a fundamental tool for controlling reproductive growth

Farming management practices aiming at conserving soil moisture have been developed in arid and semiarid-areas facing water scarcity problems. Organic mulching is an effective method to manipulate the crop-growing microclimate increasing crop yield by controlling soil temperature, and retaining soil moisture by reducing soil evaporation. In this sense, the effectiveness of different organic mulching materials (straw mulch and grapevine pruning debris) applied within the row of a vineyard was evaluated on the soil and on the vine in a Tempranillo vineyard located in La Rioja (Spain). Organic mulches were compared with a traditional bare soil management technique (based on the use of herbicides to avoid weed incidence). Mulching coverages favourably influenced the soil water retention throughout all the grapevine vegetative cycle. However, the soil-moisture variation was not the same under different mulching materials, being the straw mulch (SM) the one that retained more water in comparison with grapevine pruning debris (GPD) based-cover. The changes of soil moisture in the upper surface layer (0–10 cm) were highly dynamic, probably due to water vapour fluxes across the soil-atmospheric interface. However, both, SM and GPD reduced these fluctuations as compared with bare soils. A similar trend occurred with soil temperature. Both organic mulches altered soil temperature in comparison with bare soil by reducing soil temperature in summer and raising it in winter. Moreover, the same buffering effect for the temperature on the covered soil also remains in the deeper layers. To conclude, we could see that organic mulching had a positive impact on soil-moisture storage and soil temperature and the extent of this effect depends on the type of mulching materials. These changes led to higher rates of photosynthesis and stomatal conductivity compared to bare soils, also favouring crop growth and grape yields.

AIM: Stalks are empirically known to bring many benefits to the wine such as alcoholic reduction, color protection or improvement of the tannic intensity. Not much used on Swiss grape varieties, the aim of this study was to identify the relevance of using this type of winemaking in the case of Gamay and Gamaret red grape varieties.

The jurist feels like an intruder when talking about terroirs. He looks at the press and tries to understand. We can read there about the cooking festival of May 30, 1996 which “..highlights products whose quality depends on a region”, that Camembert du pays d’Auge is the only one to be protected, I was thinking of camembert from Normandy, that 80% of Greek feta is made in the Netherlands, I thought it was in Denmark, and that the European Community protects geographical indications of IGP origin, probably a new category replacing the indications protected areas (1). I also learned that distributors are asking for more local products because “they come to confuse the cards in the part engaged with the big brands”. Carrefour has its “Terroirs and drawers”, Prisunic its “Vent d’Ouest”, Intermarché “Les bouquets du terroir”, Monoprix “Les terroirs de France” (2), Promodés and its brand “Reflets de France” for the “Continent” hypermarkets (3). At the same time it is asserted that “The term is a mere common noun. Unprotectable and therefore unprotected” (4).

Wine colour is the first quality characteristic to be assessed, especially regarding red wines. Anthocyanins are very well known to be the main responsible compounds for red wine colour. Red cultivars can synthesize and accumulate anthocyanins in berry skin to express their colour. However, anthocyanin accumulation is often influenced by a series of factors, such as genetic regulation, phytohormones, environmental conditions and viticultural management.