From the Fields - Del Hanson

By Del Hanson, San Diego winegrape grower and vintner

We are doing some early pruning, and we’ll be turning on the irrigation system in another week or two. We’re not attached to any water districts. We’re strictly on a well. All our irrigation pumps run on grid power. The cost to bring the water uphill and to provide that pressure has gone up dramatically as electric rates rise.

We are at an elevation of 3,700 feet, and we have a nice seasonal temperature change. We have Primitivo, Trebbiano and Teroldego winegrape varieties. We’re going into our third year for these vines, so we’re still dropping grapes until they’re more established. We may harvest in year four, but that is dependent upon the timing for our winery. We are generally not near other San Diego wineries, so we have to pay probably 30% more to get labor crews to come to us.

We are also making wine from native Manzanita. Native Americans made a cider from the Manzanita. My wife and I were saying this native exotic fruit is already here, why don’t we make wine from it? I’ve been doing that for about five years. It tastes like high-end apple cider. It doesn’t take any water, and it doesn’t require any pesticides.

We’re in the process of building our winery and tasting room. By the time we open, we should be crushing our first grapes. Our farm is in the unincorporated area of San Diego called Alpine. The winery and tasting room are being permitted now. We’ve been trying to get the winery done through San Diego County. The largest hurdle we’ve had in establishing the farm has been regulatory. We started shopping a year ago and found a couple of cities that were favorable to business and to farming. It is a bit of a letdown because we wanted to build it at the farm, but it’s too costly and time intensive. We were able to get it done in another area that wants to have us there.