Warm winter weather forces vineyards into unprecedented territory

By John Lauritsen

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    DELLWOOD, Minnesota (WCCO) — Mild temperatures are impacting plants and trees in a variety of different ways, and Minnesota vineyards are now entering unprecedented territory.

“Last year I had to snowshoe through the whole vineyard, and I haven’t had to use any of my snowshoes this year,” said Geneva Knutson of 7 Vines Vineyard.

Some of the workers on Knutson’s crew were actually pruning grape vines in T-shirts this week. That’s when they noticed something highly unusual.

“All these cuts I’m making, the other day, they were sticky to the touch. Which normally isn’t happening until March or even April,” said Knutson.

It means that the roots are starting to wake up and the sap is starting to flow.

“Everybody has been talking about this because it’s a big gamechanger,” said Matt Scott.

Scott is a general manager at 7 Vines Vineyard in Dellwood. He said if the vines try to produce grapes too early, and are hit by frost and snow, it could harm the grape crop.

“Once that sugary water comes up, the cells swell up, we get a cold spell and that can damage the cellular structure. That’s the truth, not just for grape vines but for apple trees and a lot of fruit trees,” said Scott.

It’s a scary outlook considering there are now nearly 100 wineries in Minnesota. And the past couple of years have been extremely successful. Coming off a record year, 7 Vines Vineyard harvested more than 70,000 pounds of grapes by mid-September.

Since they don’t know what the weather has in store for the rest of February and March, they’ll just keep working, hoping that normal winter weather doesn’t come roaring back. If it stays mild, they could be looking at another record year.

“This could be one of those West Coast wakeups where it’s going to feel more like the north part of California. And that, for us, would be amazing. We’d probably be harvesting fruit in August instead of September and October,” said Scott.

He said the lack of snow cover, which acts as energy for sleeping winter vines, is also creating confusion for the plants.

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