The objective of this episode is to get vital information out to winegrowers everywhere about Pierce’s Disease, or Xylella fastidiosa (and you’ll get a whole lot more as well). Pierce’s Disease/Xylella fastidiosa isn’t a new concern for many winegrowers, but it has recently hit the news in a way that has whipped up a frenzy of new attention in California… and much of that attention is misguided, will actually cause more harm, and will incentivize the spread of Pierce’s Disease. So Drew and I recorded this conversation to serve as a resource for California especially, but also for the world… as Pierce’s Disease was found in Europe over 10 years ago, and it will likely spread globally. And it can kill vineyards. If you haven’t listened to it, I also recently released a short episode called “Is Pierce’s Disease the New Phylloxera?”

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In this conversation with Drew Herman, Viticulturist at Barbour Vineyard Management in Napa and Sonoma, we do a comprehensive examination of the issues surrounding and related to Pierce’s Disease, and in doing so we cover topics that apply to everything related to growing wine. Even if you don’t have to worry about Pierce’s Disease where you are, this conversation has a huge amount of information that will be relevant to everyone in wine.

We dig into bacteriophages, the difference between tolerance and resistance. how pd/xf affects a vine and how the vine reacts to it, what causes it and facilitates its spread, why aren’t our vines able to deal with it and what about our vines or the way that we grow them makes them so sexy and attractive to sap sucking insects? And the real reasons the news is vilifying “immigrant” bugs. We also find out about how our nutritional mistakes and practices can help or harm plants and dial insect predation up and down, why sap analysis and foliar feeding are potentially especially important for vines on rootstock, why rootstock affects your wine pH, the importance of the timing of nutrition, how trellising incentivizes vegetative growth and billables and insect predation, the importance of sex and the need to breed new grapes and crowdsource breeding... because this is bigger than institutions. We also reveal the once in a lifetime opportunity that is available for a brave CA Winery… maybe it could be you?

Resources mentioned in this episode:

Wine Liberated: The Ecological Revolution and the Vintners Inspiring Change

Is Pierce’s Disease the New Phylloxera?

Genetic Analysis of North American Vitis Species Related to Pierce’s Disease

Annie Bruno PD/Xf Thesis

Cost Analysis of PD/Xf to California

Research into the effectiveness of XylPhi-PD Bacteriophage inoculation

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