Developing and assessing different cordon establishment techniques for long-term vineyard management

Vine growers face an increasing number of decisions, both tactical and strategic, in a context where available data and constraints are on the rise, such as resources, societal, environmental, climatic, and economic factors. This has led to a growing supply of decision support systems (DSS) and softwares to manage vineyards. Facing this new complexity, growers must now consider several options: giving up the use of DSS, using systems that are compatible with each other but may limit their options, or using a single system that may be too complex to use effectively. In this context, itk has expanded its Vintel® tool, which was originally designed for grapevine water status management (irrigation, inter-row, cover-crop, etc.), to include fertilization and disease management.

Rosé wine consumption is rapidly increasing with its market share in France that has grown from 11 % to 32 % in less than 20 years. A recent trend is also to produce rosé wines with lighter colors. Varieties, terroir and technology certainly have an influence on rosé wine colors.

«L’Observatoire Grenache» est un réseau de parcelles qui a été mis en place par l’Institut Rhodanien en Vallée du Rhône sur les millésimes de 1995 à 1999. Composé de 24 parcelles de Vitis vinifera L. cv Grenache noir, ce réseau vise à étudier l’influence du terroir (sol, climat et vigneron) sur la qualité des vins. Les parcelles ont été choisies afin de représenter différentes situations géographiques et géopédologiques de la vallée du Rhône. Le matériel végétal (clone, porte-greffe), la taille (cordon de Royat), la densité et l’âge de la parcelle ont été encadrées. Ainsi les conditions de milieu (sol, climat) et les pratiques du vigneron étaient les principales sources de variations.

Water status impact in viticulture has been widely explored, as it strongly affects grapevine physiology and grape chemical composition. It is considered as a key component of vitivinicultural terroir. Most of the studies concerning grapevine water status have focused on either physiological traits, or berry compounds, or traits involved in wine quality. Here, the response of grapevine to water availability during the ripening period is assessed through non-targeted metabolomics analysis of grape berries by ultra-high resolution mass spectrometry. The grapevine water status has been assessed during 2 consecutive years (2019 & 2020), through carbon isotope discrimination on juices from berries collected at maturity (21.5 brix approx.) for 2 Vitis vinifera cv. Pinot noir (PN) and Chardonnay (CH). A total of 220 grape juices were collected from 5 countries worldwide (Italy; Argentina; France; Germany; Portugal). Measured δ13C (‰) varied from -28.73 to -22.6 for PN, and from -28.79 to -21.67 for CH. These results also clearly revealed higher water stress for the 2020 vintage. The same grape juices have been analysed by Fourier Transform Ion Cyclotron Resonance Mass Spectrometry (FT-ICR-MS) and Liquid Chromatography coupled to Mass Spectrometry (LC-qTOF-MS), leading to the detection of up to 4500 CHONS containing elemental compositions, and thus likely tens of thousands of individual compounds, which include fatty acids, organic acids, peptides, phenolics, also with high levels of glycosylation. Multivariate statistical analysis revealed that up to 160 elemental compositions, covering the whole range of detected masses (100 –1000 m/z), were significantly correlated to the observed gradients of water status. Examples of chemical markers, which are representative of these complex fingerprints, include various derivatives of the known abscisic acid (ABA), such as phaesic acid or abscisic acid glucose ester, which are significantly correlated with higher water stress, regardless of the variety. Cultivar-specific behaviours could also be identified from these fingerprints. Our results provide an unprecedented representation of the metabolic diversity, which is involved in the water status regulation at the grape level, and which could contribute to a better knowledge of the grapevine mitigation strategy in a climate change context.

AIM: Pre-fermentative fining is one of the central steps of white wine production. Mainly aiming at reducing the levels of suspended solids, juice fining can also assist in reducing the content of oxidizable phenolics and therefore the susceptibility of juice to oxidation.