State-of-the-art of tools and methods to assess vine water status

Abstract

Rising global air temperatures will lead to an increased evapotranspiration and altered precipitation pattern. In many regions this may result in a negative water balance during the vegetative cycle, which can augment the risk of drought and will require mitigation strategies. These strategies, ultimately, will mean the installation of irrigation systems in some winegrowing regions where vines were cultivated historically under rain-fed conditions and growers do not have many years of experience with vine water management.This review aims to provide a state-of-the-art summary of the recent and most important literature on vine water assessment for monitoring and adapting vineyard management strategies to production goals in view of global warming. Plant, soil and atmospheric methods are reviewed, and their advantages and drawbacks are discussed. Recent advances in plant water status measurement reveal the limitation of traditional techniques such as water potential, particularly in the context of drought and high vapor pressure deficit and the discoveries regarding hydraulic and stomatal regulation. New technologies can integrate heterogeneous sources of information collected in the vineyard at different spatial and temporal resolutions. Such new approaches offer new synergies to overcome limitations inherent to plant water status measurement techniques obtained directly or indirectly from proxy measurements.

Quality assessment of grape juice from integrated, organic and biodynamic viticulture using image forming methods

“…In the two organic treatments, grapes were more exposed to light and their compactness was reduced. This different fruit morphology likely contributed to the lower incidence of acetic acid rot in organic versus integrated management systems, and these effects were even more pronounced for biodynamic versus organic management systems (Meissner et al, 2019). These results suggest that organic, and especially biodynamic management practices, promote favourable grape morphology and thereby product quality.…”

“…Sharp increases in the global production of organic and biodynamic viticulture and the consumption of their products over recent decades (Willer et al, 2013;Castellini et al, 2017) demonstrate the remarkable interest of both winegrowers and consumers in vineyard management systems with a presumed reduced environmental impact. In response to this trend, a long-term and randomised field trial was established in 2006 (Geisenheim, Germany) to compare the influences of integrated, organic and biodynamic management systems on the development of plants, pests and diseases, as well as the impact on soil and the product quality of grapes and wine (Meissner et al, 2010;Meissner et al, 2019). In the first four years of the trial, the two organic management systems exhibited higher soil quality, lower grape yield and lower vegetative growth compared to the integrated management system.…”

A vine physiology-based terroir study in the AOC-Lavaux region in Switzerland

“…The average values for the main compounds which determine berry quality in all plots at the last sampling date in the three different years are depicted in Figure 6 (A-E). The δ13C analysis ( Figure 6E) shows that no water deficit (δ13C < -26) was experienced by the vines in 2017 and 2019, and that water deficit was mild (-24.5 to -26) to moderate (-23 to -23) in 2018 (Rienth and Scholasch 2019). No differences were found in N ass between different years; however, a greater variability between plots can be observed in 2019 ( Figure 6F).…”

“…As can be seen in Figure 8, Ѱ Leaf in most affected plots reached values as low as -1.5 MPa, corresponding to severe water stress. However, most of the assessed plots were within the range of mild to severe water stress, with values of between -1.1 and -1.3 MPa (Rienth and Scholasch, 2019;van Leeuwen et al, 2009;Zufferey, 2007). It is well known that water deficits can cause a reduction in berry size, depending on their severity and time of occurrence during berry development (Ojeda et al, 2001;Ojeda et al, 1999;Scholasch and Rienth, 2019).…”

Recent advancements in understanding the terroir effect on aromas in grapes and wines

“…Radiation can be easily quantified as well (Smart, 1986). Many indicators have been validated to assess vine nitrogen status (Spayd et al, 1993;van Leeuwen et al, 2000;Hilbert et al, 2003) and vine water status (Cifre et al, 2005;van Leeuwen et al, 2009;Rienth and Scholasch, 2019). Today, major parameters determining terroir expression can be quantified and even spatialized at vineyard scale (van Leeuwen et al, 2018;de Rességuier et al, 2020).…”