Monroe County vineyards battle wet conditions

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We are in the harvest season for the vineyards but with all the rain we have had recently, what is this year’s harvest like?

MONROE COUNTY, PA – Grapes on the vine thrive very well at Blue Ridge Estate Vineyard and Winery near Kunkletown.

Randy Detrick and his wife own the business. Randy worked hard to harvest grapes to make wine. Despite all the rain, things are looking pretty good.

“I would say rain doesn’t matter as much as soil retention. You want a lot of drainage in the soil, and Blue Ridge is built on the side of a hill; it’s all shale here. When it rains. , it flows very fast. The rain didn’t bother me. It is very windy here, so the leaves are drying out, you don’t get powdery mildew, you don’t have wet feet because the roots are sitting in the water so you’re fine. If you have a vineyard with poor drainage, the rain is a problem for you, “said Detrick.

While Mother Nature didn’t have a negative impact on the grapes, she did put a bit of a brake on those who wanted to sit outside and enjoy their glass of wine.

“The biggest challenge with the rain this year, I think for every winery, when it rains on weekends, it deters people from going out and visiting wineries. Most wineries, like Blue Ridge , have hundreds and hundreds of seats, all outside So hopefully every Friday, Saturday and Sunday it doesn’t rain so people can enjoy the vineyards as we have seats right in the vineyards Said Detrick.

Not far from Blue Ridge Winery is Big Creek Vineyard and Winery near Kresgeville.

Dominic Strohlein runs the establishment in the canton of Polk. His biggest problem this year? Lack of sun because of the big clouds.

“It’s not really the rain that’s the problem. When it rains, the sun isn’t there. If we could schedule it to rain only at night, it would have been a very good year. A vineyard. adult in our area, on our soil, needs an inch of rain every 10 days to thrive, and that’s really a lot of rain. We haven’t seen this in ages. It’s not the rain is the lack of sunshine, and that’s something we can’t do anything about, ”Strohlein said.

You also can’t pick grapes when it’s raining.

With the potential for some over the next few days, Dominic says he will start harvesting his grapes on Monday.

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