Region in focus: SA Central

Dealing efficiently and effectively with Eutypa and trunk diseases remains a focus for the SA Central region, with a number of activities rolled out in the past 12 months to educate growers and offer tools to help manage vineyards presenting with symptoms.

And the benefits are being felt beyond SA Central’s own GIs. Viticulturists and winemakers from D’Arenberg, Chapel Hill, Taylors, Bleasdale, Hamilton Viticulture and First Pick Viticulture have worked with SARDI Research Scientist Mark Sosnowski to create an instructional video on Eutypa dieback, which can be accessed via the Wine Australia website.

There is also a fact sheet created in collaboration with grower groups in the Clare Valley, and that spirit of cooperation saw the ‘Let’s hit the road…Eutypa Experience’ bus tour in early June for visits to Taylors Vineyards and Geoff Lewis’ Wattle Farm vineyards.

In a more conventional vein, the Annual Viticulture Innovation Day in Langhorne Creek last October focused on Eutypa management and included a field walk of local vineyards where restructuring had started.

This was followed by a Pruning in Practice Day in April, where topics for discussion included decision making when pruning, preventative treatments for dieback and pruning for improved yield and vine balance.

‘We also presented a simple Excel-based decision making tool to help individual vineyards assess the profitability and impact of dealing with Eutypa and trunk diseases’, said the Executive Officer of Langhorne Creek Grape and Wine, Lian Jaensch. ‘The aim was to help identify the “tipping point” for rework, restructuring or removal.’

Participants also looked at the latest pruning equipment and examined some of the restructured vineyards to discuss the whys and wherefores behind the decisions for these vineyards.