FAYETTEVILLE — Owners of Midwestern vineyards employing some form of mechanization have heard of Justin R. Morris — a distinguished professor emeritus at the University of Arkansas Department of Food Science.
Industry and academic researchers affiliated with a few of the country’s biggest grape producers referred to the retired professor’s research on mechanizing parts of the grape-growing process Wednesday morning during a workshop.
About 75 people attended the all-day event held to celebrate the recently published Vineyard Mechanization: Development and Status in the United States and in Major Grape Producing Regions of the World, edited by Justin R. Morris and Pamela L. Brady.
Nick Dokoozlian, vice president of viticulture, chemistry and enology at E.&J. Gallo Winery in Modesto, Calif., characterized Morris’ vineyard-to-glass approach to production as prescient.
In Morris’ generation, he more than any other researcher defined the philosophy used today: how to increase production efficiency while maintaining quality, Dokoozlian said.
“There might not be grapes grown on a large scale in the Midwest or Washington or New York, without Justin’s work,” Dokoozlian said.
Arkansas’ 2010 grape-crop forecast of 2,300 tons is dwarfed in a national comparison with lead producing states.
Total 2010 production in the country was forecast at 6.88 million tons, and California, at a projected 6.15 million tons, is the leading grape producer in the country, followed by Washington and New York, according to United States Department of Agriculture data.
Parts of Arkansas trace their grape-growing origins back to 1880, said Al Wiederkehr, president of Swiss Family Vineyards and Wiederkehr Wine Cellars Inc. in Altus.
And the family vineyards also boast having been the first in the state to automate pruning in the 1960s, Wiederkehr said.
“When I met Morris, he was doing peaches,” he said. Morris made his living from grapes and went on to become a distinguished academic of grape cultivation and winemaking.
Grapes in Northwest Arkansas became an important commercial crop in the 1920s, when Welch Foods Inc. built a processing plant in Springdale in 1923. The crop slowly lost value to local farmers when the plant was shuttered in the late 1970s.
Terry Bates, director of Cornell University’s Lake Erie Viticulture Research and Extension Laboratory in Portland, N.Y., offered insight into how technologically advanced the science of grape growing has become.
The researcher showed images of laser-scanned vineyards to help quantify production practices for Concord and Niagara varieties.
While machine use is not new among vineyard owners, what is unique about Morris’ approach is his concept of “balanced cropping.”
The system that could trade off growing conditions to maximize leaf size and fruit load was aided by a piece of farm equipment able to prune, and thin shoots and fruit, before harvesting. More than 40 tools can be employed to cut more than a dozen different grape varieties and trellising systems, as previously reported by the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
His technology, which is also referred to as the Morris-Oldridge system, a reference to local farmer and inventor Tommy Oldridge, was patented by UA in 2002 and then licensed to Oxbo International Corp. of Byron, N.Y.
Mechanization continues to be touted as reducing a vineyard’s cost of production and is seen as critical in grape-growing regions with short labor supplies.
Business, Pages 26 on 11/17/2011