Planting A Vineyard: The Process of Growing Wine Grapes
April 3, 2023
As Violet Vines has grown from just shy of three acres under vine to thirty acres in the McMinnville AVA and Milton-Freewater Ava (the Rocks District), we’ve received dozens of questions from our wine club members as well as others that visit us to sample our wines.
The two most common questions we’ve received are:
1. What does the process look like to select, plant, and farm a new vineyard?
2. After you plant a new vineyard, when do you start seeing fruit?
To answer the first question, we created this drawing to summarize the journey. The process might be a little different by winery, grape varietal, or geography, but this has been our experience so far.
To answer the second question, we’ll answer based on what we’re planning for this upcoming 2023 growing season. For the vines planted in the Fall of 2020, 2023 represents their “third leaf” which means they’re ready to produce some grapes. In 2023, were expecting 4/5 of a ton of fruit per acre. We limit the fruit to about 25-30% of a normal yield to avoid over-stressing the vines and to continue developing the root structure (as a side note, our normal yield target is 2.5 to 3 tons per acre).
In 2024, we’ll move the yield target to 70% and in 2025, 100%. We’re incredibly excited for 2023 where we’ll bring in more Pinot noir 115 and our first Pinot noir Wadenswil Clone and Pinot noir Clone 828, as well as Chardonnay Clones 76 and 95. This year also marks the first year producing wine at our estate winery and our first sparkling wine production!