Connecticut remains in a drought, and parts of Litchfield County are now in a severe drought.
While many farmers are worried about how the dry conditions will impact their crops ahead of the winter season, for wineries, the dry weather is a good thing.
“Once we get grapes on the actual vine, dry weather is excellent. It helps reduce disease pressure, we don’t have to worry about fungi developing as much,” explained Maureen Macdonald, head winemaker at Hawk Ridge Winery in Watertown. “Luckily, we grow one of the few crops that doesn’t need a lot of water. Grape vines actually do better the more they struggle for water.”
She said in her 12 years of winemaking, she’s never experienced a season quite as dry as this one.
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“We luckily have already picked all of our grapes for the season, so it’s not going to influence the 2024 crop, but looking into 2025, we do have a few concerns.”
It’s getting grapes on the vine next year that she’s worried about.
“The spring really is the pivotal time where water is a little bit more crucial in order for the plant to develop properly,” she added. “If our vines are really, really struggling in order to draw up their nutrients -- Some of those nutrients are critical in order to form the flowers and self-pollinate and generate the grapes later on in the season.”
She’s hoping the dry conditions don’t last into the spring so the grapes for their popular wines can grow fruitfully.
“As long as we get some good rain in 2025, we’re hoping that the new year brings in some warmer and damp weather so we can actually get a decent bed of moisture and increase our water table to sustain us through 2025,” Macdonald said. “As long as we have a good, moist spring we should be OK.”
