Seasonal Shifts

The Lifecycle of a Vineyard

Believe it or not, vineyards are active all year round. While tasting rooms scale back hours and the vineyard sites look quiet, there is actually a lot going on in the winter. Vineyard work is hands-on throughout the year, and each vine is touched by humans an average of 17 times during its lifecycle. 

This beautiful area right around Salem is on or near the 45th Parallel – prime real estate in the ideal wine growing latitudes (between 30° and 50° on the map). The vines in our area have been dormant since late November after harvest when they dropped their leaves. Winter dormancy is a crucial part of a vine's lifecycle when the grape vines are conserving their energy for the burst of activity that starts in the spring. December to late February are the typical months for dormancy, and vineyard workers are taking that time to manage the vines with pruning to make sure that they are a manageable size for the next harvest yield.

The vines respond to warmer temperatures which signals that it's time to come out of dormancy. When the ground temperature rises above 50°, the trunks start moving sap out towards the branches known as canes. This is called "weeping," and it's the beginning step on the vine's journey to the next harvest. Soon after weeping, there's a major growth spurt.

What we're looking for in March is bud break –  that's when the first tiny green leaves start to emerge. This is risky business because around here, we know we can get a late snow fall or frost, and that could damage these delicate shoots. Winemakers and vineyard hands are on alert.

The shoots get stronger and start to produce leaves that are trained to grow along the trellis systems set up by the vineyard. They can start photosynthesis then and take in the energy from the sun (remember 7th grade science?). This accelerates growth, and the vines are up and running for their new crop. About a month and a half after bud break, the vines flower. Fun fact: grapes vines are self-pollinating. Local winds blow the pollen from one part of the plant to another, so warm, dry days are ideal. When it's really rainy or too windy, this can affect the pollination of the grapevines which can result in fewer surviving grapes for the new harvest. This part of the growing cycle lasts until around June, when it's time to start making berries.

Those tiny green balls on the flower start to develop into berries, and this transition is called "fruit set" or "berry set." They take all summer to grow into the sweet round grapes that will make our wine.

All grapes start out hard and green with very little sugar and a whole lot of acid. They grow slowly over a couple of months or so, and then *bam* veraison ("ver-ay-shun" covered in a previous post). This is when the fruit starts to rapidly ripen on the highway to harvest.

Wine Folly has a great article about this lifecycle, too, if you'd like to read more. 

So, if you're taking it slow in the winter months, remember that there's still a lot of action in the vineyards, and there's still wine to taste from previous years while we're waiting for the harvest of 2026. It's a nice time to support local growers by visiting some wineries around Salem.

Come on by Studio Vino Wine Hub for a sip or two. We're open through the winter for drop-ins and some fun classes. We're looking forward to seeing you!

Resolutions

 Community Engagement

One of our goals at Studio Vino is creating a vibrant, wine-appreciating community in Salem, Oregon. With that in mind, I thought I would share a few of my wine-related new year resolutions with everyone. My goals are personal, but perhaps you get some new ideas as well!

1. Taste more

This one seems obvious to most folks on a wine learning journey, but I want to be more intentional about tasting. See an interesting grape? Try it! Don't just drink it...study it, learn about its history and place in Oregon, taste and take notes. Case in point: Johan Vineyards has a Ribolla Gialla that they bottle unfiltered. I am not familiar with that grape at all, as it's an ancient grape from Italy that is rare to find here in Oregon.

An intentional wine tasting might include doing some research on Ribolla Gialla and reading up on what might be typical for that wine's aromas and flavors. I would chill the wine, invite some other curious friends, get my notes ready, and uncork it. We would smell, sip, and discuss to see if what we learned about the grape is showing up in the glass.

A wine you would not normally choose can become a catalyst for learning, so take that chance and taste more (intentionally)!

True or False: Ribolla Gialla is a red grape variety. *

2. Hone a (Specific) Skill

Wine tasting is not simply drinking wine: it's a series of skills that you can train yourself on. Can't identify oak when you're tasting? You can learn about how oak shows up in finished wine and train yourself to find it. Identifying aromas in wine is a trainable skill; parsing flavors in wine is something you can improve; it just takes practice.

Rather than improving my wine tasting skills generally, my goal is to choose one skill and really focus on it. Wine tasting grids for programs like WSET and CSW ask you to look at the wine, smell the wine, taste the wine, and identify aromas, flavors, alcohol (heat), finish, age, and quality. So practice is essential, but like tasting, should be intentional.

I, personally, want to learn how to work on identifying the alcohol level in wine. It's not something that is easy for me to taste or sense, so I need to figure out how to discern different ABV levels more accurately. I'll figure out how by talking to others, reading about it, and, of course, tasting wine, but one thing at a time.

Resolve to choose a specific thing to work on with your wine tasting and take a deep dive.  

3. Grow Community 

Wine tasting is something that can be done solo, with an agreeable friend, or with a group of other wine aficionados. This year, I would like to foster growth in my personal wine community. I taste alone a lot...where are my people? I'm growing by talking to others, getting out to wineries, and blogging into the internet void, and if I can lure enough people to Studio Vino, I think I have a shot at this wine resolution.

Join me for some of our events this year at Studio Vino (Tuesday Tasting Group or Willamette Wines, for example) or just drop in! Help me with resolution number three...I can't wait to meet you (and I have wine).

*Quiz answer: Ribolla Gialla is a white grape from northern Italy (Fruili)