GiESCO 2017 – Session 3: Breeding, varieties, clones, and rootstocks

In the province of San Juan (Argentina), the area of the Jáchal river presents a high potential for the production of grapes used for high quality wines.

Autochthonous varieties, called ‘criollas’, are highly cultivated in South America. For instance, in Peru or Chile they are used for making Pisco. In Argentina, they represent 33% of the grapevine cultivated area.

Botrytis cinerea causes one of the most serious diseases in grapevines namely Botrytis Bunch Rot (BBR). A classification of different grapevine cultivars (cvs.) according to their susceptibility to B. cinerea is an essential management indicator in Integrated Pest Management. Although such classifications are available, they are based mostly on professional experience rather than experimental results.

The ascomycota fungus Guignardia bidwellii, responsible for the black rot disease of grapevine is causing increasing damages in Hungary especially in organic vineyards without chemical disease management.

Genotype x Environment x Practices interactions exert a tight tuning on wine profile. To maintain the typicality of wine produced in traditional regions becomes a critical challenge in the context of rapid climate changes. While some practices may reduce adverse effects of abiotic stresses on the vine (e.g. the use of watering to maintain photosynthesis), the impacts of high temperature stresses on berry development are more difficult to manage.

Much has been already written regarding the gluthationylate (GSH-) and cisteinylate (Cys-) precursors of 3-mercaptohexan-1-ol (3MH) since the discovery of their presence in grapes and juices.

In the Table Grape Breeding Program developed at the Junín, Mendoza, Rama Caída and San Juan Agricultural Experimental Stations of the National Institute of Agricultural Technology (INTA), the cultivars Delicia INTA, Fernandina INTA, Serena INTA and Sorpresa INTA were obtained.

Murcia is the Spanish region that produces and exports the largest amount of table grapes, with some European countries consuming a large proportion of the 168,000 tons produced.

Monastrell is the most extended variety in the South east of Spain. One of our strategies for improving its wines consists in selecting intraspecific hybrids arising from crosses between Monastrell and other high quality varieties, such as Cabernet Sauvignon, looking for those well adapted to our conditions, with a high polyphenol content and a high phenolic extractability, in order to produce highly colored wines.

CSIRO rootstock breeding aims to provide industry with enhanced material to meet challenges associated with the Australian environment, future climate scenarios (high temperatures, limited water supply and drought) and soil-borne pests (phylloxera and root knot nematodes). In this study, analysis of results from three long term field trials with Shiraz grafted on genotypes from a single family involving Vitis cineria, V. champini, V. riparia and V. rupestris has shown that vine performance and fruit composition can be linked to simple traits, measured on field grown ungrafted seedlings or as ungrafted or grafted nursery grown plants.

In recent years, consumers shifted their interest towards products coming from a viticulture less dependent on chemical inputs also focusing on hybrid varieties.

Water is the main factor limiting yield in viticulture. Vine water status also strongly impacts grape quality.

Tolerance to fungi has been the subject of recent programs in France since the 1970s(A. Bouquet, INRA Montpellier). The objective of these programs, initiated from Muscadinia rotundifolia and based on 5 to 6 backcrosses with different Vitis vinifera varieties, was to approach the profile of V. vinifera to be combined with a strong resistance to powdery and downy mildews from Muscadinia