From the Fields - Bruce Fry

By Bruce Fry, San Joaquin County winegrape grower

The growing season has been good so far, but we still have a little way to go. Things are growing nicely due to the bountiful rainfall we’ve had, which is great. It saves us from starting our irrigation pumps early like we have in past years during the drought. That helps save some money, which is good because we don’t know what the market is going to do. The market seems to be a little soft on winegrapes, but it could change. It’s June already, so that’s three months, a decent amount of savings.

With all the rainfall and cool weather that we’ve had, things are about two weeks later than last year, but Mother Nature could change things as we know. We’re in the vineyard finishing shoot thinning, and then we’re going to start leafing with our mechanical leafer and doing some weed spraying or chemical sucker spraying as needed.

Regarding employees, there should be enough people. Right now, cherry season is going on. You always have people leave your crews to go pick cherries, so right now there is that exodus to do that. Crews—at least mine—get small now, and when you are trying to do shoot thinning, suckering and some other things in the vineyards, it slows your timing. It makes you behind, but it’s just what happens.

It seems like there’s labor available because I have farm labor contractors bugging me. There seems to be enough employees because there’s been a lot more trees planted around the area and fewer vineyards being replanted. With very few vineyards being replanted, there’s not a lot of people who are needed to do the tying and installation of new vineyards and planting, so that might be a reason too.