John and Patrice O’Shea have been blessed with near-perfect autumn weather in their vineyard in Central Victoria’s Macedon Ranges, but three weeks ago it looked a little different.
In the lead-up to vintage, the small-scale growers said a planned burn next door by Forest Fire Management resulted in smoke lingering in their crop for days.
Now, they are worried their grapes will be tainted and become useless, just before harvest.
“I totally get that they have to burn, that’s understandable but, with a little bit of consultation, maybe they could have pushed it back until after Easter or something,” Mr O’Shea said.
Just before harvest, the skin of the wine grape is at its thinnest and is extremely vulnerable to smoke as it can penetrate the skin.
Entire crops lost to smoke taint
Entire crops have been lost to smoke taint in previous years because of large bushfires and planned burns. Some producers have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars in value in a single day.
Mornington Peninsula Vignerons Association chief executive Olivia Barrie said such smoke taint had been an issue for years.
“There has certainly been years with big smoke events when the smoke has come at a particular time, when smoke has settled and not moved – it can be devastating to a grapevine crop,” Ms Barrie said.
And it’s not just planned burns affecting harvest, burn-offs by private landholders can also be damaging.
Call for better communication
Ms Barrie said there needed to be better lines of communication between growers, landowners and Forest Fire Management, which includes staff from Parks Victoria, VicForests, Melbourne Water and the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning.
“We really understand that they’ve got windows that they have to operate to, but so do we,” she said.
“We’ve only got one harvest a year, we’ve got one shot at vintage every year, and so it’s really important that we try and keep that safe.”
Bushfires are main concern
Forest Fire Management said it consulted with winegrowers and other community groups across Victoria about timing the fires and alleviating the effects of smoke, but said there were only a handful of days in a year that were suitable for burns.
It said ultimately, mitigating the risks of large bushfires was its main concern.
Deputy Chief Fire Officer Tamara Beckett said there was a natural tension between many groups in the community around timed burns in autumn.
“By the time we get into early May or even late April in some parts of the state, it’s simply too wet.
“We know that the biggest impact to businesses. to the economy and to wine is large-scale bushfires, where smoke can linger not just for a day or two, but for many weeks or sometimes months.”
Winegrowers’ nervous wait
But in autumn, time is of the essence for wine growers.
The O’Shea family is now waiting nervously to see if there will be a return on the fruits of their labour.
“We’re halfway through fermentation, so we won’t really know until it’s finished and the grapes are pressed,” Mr O’Shea said.
“What I’d like to think is that FFM would acknowledge that this mightn’t be perfect, and they might just genuinely consult and wait a couple of weeks.”