Wine Production : Vine to Bottle - Vinum Vine

Environmental Approaches
in the Vineyard
Numerous environmental considerations must be taken into account
and managed appropriately in the growing of vines and production of
grapes for wine. Of growing significance is the production of grapes
using environmentally sensitive methods and particularly those encompassed
by the developing concept of environmental sustainability.
6.1 Integrated pest management (IPM)
The days when grape growers were held hostage to the agro-chemical
salesman are perhaps forever behind us. It seems that every grower
is practising ‘la lutte raisonnée’, ‘integrated pest management’,
‘sustainable viticulture’ or whatever title they choose to use. During
the 1960s, ’70s and ’80s it seemed that you could not enter a vineyard
without seeing routine preventative spraying, or applications of
yield ‘enhancing’ chemicals. Now, cover crops abound and the gentle
hum of ‘beneficial’ insects is the main sound to be heard. And yet
the standards of vineyard hygiene are perhaps higher than ever.
In 1991, the ITV (Centre Technique Interprofessionnel de la Vigne
et du Vin) published Protection Raisonnée du Vignoble (ITV, 1991).
It has become both bible and practical guide to thousands of growers
needing to fight pests and maladies of the vine, be they cryptogams,
bacteria, viruses or mycoplasmata. Conversion to integrated pest
management (IPM) is reasonably straightforward. The grower has to
identify possible problems, consider the various prophylactic methods
of treatment, estimate the risk of the problems occurring (this is the
real key to success) and then undertake treatments only as necessary
and mindful of the wider consequences. For example, when spraying
is necessary, instead of cannon spraying it is possible to use a precise
39