Post
Back-to-back bad years for grapes
Following two hard winters, Ravenhurst Champagne Cellars in Central Ohio did not harvest any grapes in 2015.
Winemaker Chuck Harris says with the vines struggling to produce grapes this year, they decided early on to prune them from the vines and leave them on the ground—in essence giving the vineyard a year off.
“Granted I could have harvested maybe a half of crop, but they would have come due in August, in the middle of the heat instead of September when I wanted them,” said Harris. “They would have been way out of balance because it’s a vineyard that’s used to producing four tons to the acre, I would have been getting much less, so I think for the quality of the wine and for the good of the vineyard we did the right thing.”
Harris says that doesn’t mean they won’t have any wine available.
“We don’t bottle everything we produce every year, so there are things in the pipeline that will keep us having wine,” Harris said. “And I always have new vineyards coming online, we plant new grapes every year.”
Ravenhurst Champaign Cellars was one of the stops on the Leadership Ohio Ag Weekend.
Audio: Chuck Harris, Ravenhurst Champagne Cellars
-
-
We know how much you carer for your vineyards and understand and applaud your efforts and success at Ravenhurst!!!!!! Richard and John
My vineyard was way down below 25%, but of more damage to my business has been caused by the superfluous regulation of wineries as food processing facilities. Wine has no food safety issues as it kills human pathogens. For information on the unnecessary, superfluous, duplicate (of licensing and sanitation in liquor codes), and discriminatory (in favor of out of state wineries and in state ones producing grape juice) regulation of Ohio wineries by the Ohio Department of Agriculture please see: http://www.FreeTheWineries.com or http://www.facebook.com/FreeTheWineries