By Clint Thompson
Despite a recent drop in the number of growers, interest in grape production still remains in the Southeast region in Alabama and Georgia, according to Sarah Lowder, University of Georgia (UGA) viticulture Extension specialist.
“It’s something where I think we definitely have seen a slowdown from, five years ago or so, 5 to 10 years ago, where there was certainly so much growth,” Lowder said. “But there’s still definitely some interest and some newer growers where we’re still trying to capture a lot of the basics.”
UGA’s recent New Grape Growers Symposium on June 6 educated potential producers about all facets of growing grapes in the Southeast. Topics ranged from variety selection, establishing a vineyard, managing pests and diseases and developing sustainable vineyard practices.
Lowder discussed the industry and how it attracts potential producers with an agriculture background and those that don’t. That makes the symposium a valuable source of information for all in attendance.
“Particularly, a lot of people get into vineyards like as a kind of a second passion career where they don’t necessarily come in from a farming background. So, there’s still like a lot of basic stuff that we always need to touch on,” Lowder said.
“The event is really geared to be both helpful for folks that are interested in potentially starting a new vineyard, which there’s still a handful of folks that qualifies for, as well as folks that have small acreage that they’re just trying to improve how they’re going about managing that acreage. And definitely the kind of crowd that we saw at the meeting was reflected by that.”