Grapes

[schmism]

for the past 3 days ive been involved in the local grape harvest hear in Central IL.

Turns out the guy that "runs" Piasa winery is my "neighbor".

Wed i picked 8500lbs of his Chardonel and 2500lbs of Traminette
thrus was 3600lbs of Traminette
today was machine pick at the winery vineyard.

unfortunately the wife grabbed the camera out of my truck last night so i didnt have it to take pics of one of the most fascinating pieces of equipment i have ever seen.

when i left the winery just after lunch today they were finishing there first press on 6000lbs of Chardonell, had another 8-9K more to go before the 4Klbs of Traminette was to come in this afternoon.

as of when i left they had 20k gallons fermenting, likely to be moved to the secondary tanks sunday.
they were filling the last 10K gallon standing tank and would have to go to the last 2 6Kgal tanks.

 

[Bird]

unfortunately the wife grabbed the camera out of my truck last night so i didnt have it to take pics of one of the most fascinating pieces of equipment i have ever seen.

You're right, that's very unfortunate because I would have liked to see that.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

You're right, that's very unfortunate because I would have liked to see that.

I am not sure what brand harvester they were using but here are a couple my friends own.

 

[schmism]

from google.... Braud

(is the back end)

front end

the "teeth" looking things are actually felxable rubber "cups" that nest with each other at the bottom to catch anything that falls off the vines as they are beaten by the side beaters.

 

[Bird]

Interesting looking machines, but I'm afraid I'm too dense to understand how they harvest the grapes without destroying the vines.

 

[schmism]

Interesting looking machines, but I'm afraid I'm too dense to understand how they harvest the grapes without destroying the vines.

dont feel to bad. after picking 14,000 lbs of grapes by hand wed, thus. having spent 16 hrs doing it by hand... i thought... how in the WORLD do you get a machine to simulate this action!

(hears a hint, your thinking to hard)

so there are these bars on the inside (seen from the front) and they (for lack of a better word) slap back and forth. Think clapping hands but instead of coming together at the same time, they are out of phase half a clap.

that effectively (quite effectively i might add) knocks all the grapes (in the wine world, "globes") off the stems. so you know when you eat "a bunch" (as in a cluster) of grapes from the store, and have that little naked x-mas tree looking stem left over, well those are (mostly) still all attached to the vines.

the globes (as best i can tell) take a little ride up the back in those cups (look like teath on the pic of the back) and up into the bins. (one on each side)

So because your just kinda nocking the vines around, not actually "pulling" on them, not really tugging on them, you really dont "tear" them up much. shure you knock off some leaves and stems, but nothing that causes any serious harm.

FYI most of the growth from one year to the next is trimmed off late winter early spring (feb/march) so all the "vinny green" stuff you see... is mostly trimmed off before next spring.

 

[Bird]

Thanks for the explanation, Steve. I've picked quite a few grapes by hand, cutting or breaking off clusters of grapes still on the vine, then later sat and picked the globes (never heard that term before) off the stems to make jelly, but have never seen the process automated.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Interesting looking machines, but I'm afraid I'm too dense to understand how they harvest the grapes without destroying the vines.

schmism gave you a decent explanation as to how these machines work. If you would like I will take some video of my friends machines harvesting and post them. It won't be for a few days though as it is still early for Niagara harvest here in WNY.

 

[frank_f15]

hey Robert what does the grape harvest look like this year, have not een up that way to see how they look.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

hey Robert what does the grape harvest look like this year, have not een up that way to see how they look.

Well, there were at least 10 different hail storms this year. Where the storms hit devestated the crop. I was very lucky and the first storm ended at the edge of my one vineyard. There were a few ice pellets that came down but nothing major but my friends vineyards were destroyed. They will be lucky to get 1 ton to the acre off of them

For us lucky guys who managed to get missed by the hail storms we had plenty of rain. All the rain made the berries grow good and I have good tonnage but because of how wet this year was it was very hard to stay in front of downy mildew and one section of my one vineyard was infected quite bad. Hopefully the sugar will keep climbing though to make everything worth while. My Niagara's will be harvested shortly and they are doing a lot better then I expected as this is a new vineyard I purchased and it was neglected. A little fertilizer and weed control made a huge difference.

 

[Bird]

Yep, Robert, I'd like to see pictures or videos of the harvest. Hope your harvest is a bountiful one.

 

[schmism]

They will be lucky to get 1 ton to the acre off of them

i got the weight wrong on the thurs Traminette, it was 3.6 tons... off a 1/2 acre

piasa winery near 62014 - Google Maps

the 7 lines closest to the driveway are the 7 rows of Traminette we picked by hand thrus.

 

[czechsonofagun]

Hmm, very tempting. Maybe when my 48 grape wines bear fruit I will have a reason to buy a huge tractor like machine

 

[Egon]

Now all ideas of tradition wine making have been Thrashed!

I keep thinking of baskets and tubs and barefooted folks stomping grapes!

 

[Robert_in_NY]

i got the weight wrong on the thurs Traminette, it was 3.6 tons... off a 1/2 acre

piasa winery near 62014 - Google Maps

the 7 lines closest to the driveway are the 7 rows of Traminette we picked by hand thrus.

Just to clarify my post some, I was referring to the Concords which is the main variety grown here. We have a lot of wine varieties also but Concord is the staple still. The vineyards were projecting 7-8 ton per acre before the hail hit them but the storm was so bad it ripped off most of the shoots and knocked off almost all the berries.

My friends grow a lot of wine varieties and I have 4 wineries within 2 miles from my main farm but I have choose to stay away from wine grapes as I really do not have the time to spend on them as to grow great wine grapes you need to spend a lot of time in the vineyard and time is one thing I seriously lack. I did look into it though but after attending the wine day at our grape conference and listening to all the growers and what they are dealing with it made me realize I was not ready for that much more work. I do love walking thru their vineyards though and seeing some of those monster bunches of grapes hanging from the vines.

If this works this link ( 2328 Rt 20, Silver Creek, NY 14136 - Google Maps ) will take you to my base farm and if you look on the other side of Rt 20 you will see all the vineyards around me. I can not even guess how many acres of vineyards are in this area. My one friend owns 400 acres, my other friend has 300 acres of just vineyards (actually owns around 2000 acres total though) then my other friends are in the 100-150 acre blocks. Right now is a great time of the year as when you step outside all you smell is the berries ripening on the vines

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Now all ideas of tradition wine making have been Thrashed!

I keep thinking of baskets and tubs and barefooted folks stomping grapes!

Well, we still do grape stomping bare footed here as part of our Grape Festival. Actually, the crew from Good Morning America just stopped at my one friends farm a few days ago as they came through on their train. While there they went to stomping grapes bare foot so the tradition isn't "Thrashed"

To make premium wine though they still harvest by hand as you have much better control over what goes into the winery.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

Hmm, very tempting. Maybe when my 48 grape wines bear fruit I will have a reason to buy a huge tractor like machine

Well, old worn out machines only cost around $20k. These new ones cost around $250k so it may take awhile for you to get your machine to pay off but you could always do custom work

 

[MossRoad]

J...
If this works this link ( 2328 Rt 20, Silver Creek, NY 14136 - Google Maps ) will take you to my base farm and if you look on the other side of Rt 20 you will see all the vineyards around me. ...

You weren't kidding when you mentioned I went right past your place on my way to Boston last year, were you!

U.S. 20 is about two blocks from my house and 80/90 is about a mile, only we're 3 states to the left...

I would also enjoy any footage you could shoot of any farm machines in operation.

 

[schmism]

Well, old worn out machines only cost around $20k. These new ones cost around $250k so it may take awhile for you to get your machine to pay off but you could always do custom work

ya the machine that came down to pick was about an hr away. There is another guy that has one but hes not as good an operator (or so i was told)

this guy does a LOT of custom harvesting. he might have a few grapes himself but my guess is he saw a need and went for it.

 

[Robert_in_NY]

You weren't kidding when you mentioned I went right past your place on my way to Boston last year, were you!

U.S. 20 is about two blocks from my house and 80/90 is about a mile, only we're 3 states to the left...

I would also enjoy any footage you could shoot of any farm machines in operation.

Sadly I wasn't kidding. I would love to not have these two roads so close to me but on the other hand it is nice anytime I want to go somewhere as these roads lead to a lot of places I need to go