Winter grape damage gets disaster relief

TRI-COUNTY AREA—After the eighth coldest winter on record, area grape growers are attempting to recover from the damage to their buds and vines. Some 19 counties in New York recently received disaster designations due to the crop damage caused by extreme cold this winter, including Yates, Schuyler and Steuben Counties. The weather especially has impacted grape growers, with more than 50 percent of buds being damaged in some areas.
Cornell Cooperative Extension Viticulture Educator Michael Colizzi said vineyards at the northernmost sections of the Finger Lakes suffered the most damage to their primary buds. He said the farther south along Keuka and Seneca Lakes, the less damage there is, despite the fact the vineyards can be relatively close to each other. Colizzi said vineyards on the western slopes of Seneca Lake that face eastward toward the lake also saw higher damage percentages than those on the other side of the lake.
“In the Finger Lakes, what we are looking at is there definitely damage out there,” Colizzi said. “It depends where you are in the Finger Lakes as to how significant that damage is. The northern part of the Finger lakes seems to have a lot worse damage than the southern part of the Finger Lakes.”
Colizzi said Yates County vineyards located around the Penn Yan area saw approximately 60 percent primary bud damage, with a 50 percent average for the Finger Lakes as a whole. He said the damage numbers are for all varieties of grapes, including varieties that normally do not suffer a lot of damage. Colizzi said up toward the Geneva area, they saw upwards of 70 percent damage. He added the Watkins Glen area averaged 42 percent damage, while Hector averaged 27 percent among all varieties. Colizzi said despite not being too far away, there is a huge difference in damage levels.
“Keuka Lake saw some significant damage around Penn Yan and out on the bluff over to Branchport,” Colizzi said.” As you go farther down Seneca Lake, from Dresden on down, it’s not awful, but it is certainly not great. When you get over to Schuyler County, over by Hector in that area, there is significantly less damage. That area tends to be warmer throughout the growing season anyway, and it definitely showed itself this year, the difference over there temperature-wise.”
Colizzi said they do not yet have numbers as to how much monetary damage was done to the vines and buds during the winter, but added “it is certainly not a cheap problem to fix.”
President of Fox Run Vineyard Scott Osborn in Penn Yan said between 30 and 90 percent of his vines were damaged by the cold depending on the variety and where they were located in his vineyard. He said the damage varies from vineyard to vineyard, but said those at the northeast end of Seneca Lake seems to have suffered the most damage.
“[Damage] varies depending on the variety, how slow or fast it got below freezing in December and then how fast it went to below zero,” Osborn said. “Then in January it depends on if it warmed up to above freezing then how fast it got cold after that.”
Osborn said cold hardiness is a complicated and a little understood aspect of growing grapes. He said there is research being done by USDA in Geneva, but added they still do not really understand why some years grapevines can be tolerant to a very low temperature and not other years.
“If it is only bud damage we just lose this year’s crop but the vines should survive if the secondaries survived,” Osborn said. “If the vines die—and we won’t know the full extent of that until the mid to late summer—it will cost somewhere around $35,000 per acre to replant and then farm it for three to four years before we get a full crop.”
In response to the damage, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) approved primary county disaster designations for five New York counties, due to losses caused by the freeze that occurred since Dec. 1, 2013. Those counties include Yates, Cattaraugus, Cayuga, Chautauqua and Oswego. Senators Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand said a secretarial natural disaster declaration will apply for all counties contiguous to those five, which include Schuyler, Steuben, Allegany, Cortland, Erie, Jefferson, Lewis, Oneida, Onondaga, Ontario, Seneca, Tompkins, Wayne and Wyoming. Schumer visited numerous wineries this winter and urged that the USDA approve this declaration so emergency loans could be made available to these farms.
Schumer and Gillibrand also urged the USDA to provide swift relief to vineyards that have suffered major crop damage from the extreme cold weather this winter through the Tree Assistance Program (TAP). Schumer explained the Tree Assistance Program (TAP) was just passed as part of the Farm Bill and can provide reimbursements to growers who suffer extensive damage to plant trunks as a result of extreme weather events, such as the freezing temperatures earlier this winter.  In the case of grape vines, as a result of the cold snap, scientists at Cornell are finding damaged buds in test studies, suggesting more than 50 percent of buds could be damaged this winter, which suggests that vine damage is also highly likely.