Unpredictable winters causing significant damage to vineyards in Niagara region

The Niagara region is seeing some of its worst winter damage in 17 years, with early estimates measuring around 50 per cent of grape vines damaged.

Chair of Grape Growers of Ontario Matthias Oppenlaender said the impact of extreme climate events is more concerning each year. Despite warmer weather bringing benefits to vineyards, the unpredictability of winter has become problematic.

"We are seeing some warm and milder winters in the past but we also see the extreme colder weather events, extreme weather events," Oppenlaender told CBC Hamilton.

"We don't know what happens from one week to the next week."

Damage in vineyards happens when the bud of a plant freezes to an extreme either in winter or spring. 

"There's a main [bud] but there's a secondary and tertiary, but when it gets too cold, then these buds freeze, they die. And obviously, the vine doesn't bud out in the springtime."

He said, however, that even the warm stretches of winter and fall affect grape vines.

"We could have a mild stretch in December — and that was part of the problem, we had a very wet fall with excessive rain and milder December and then January really, very cold."

The loss rate for crops is usually 10 to 15 per cent, Oppenlaender said, and the last time a significant loss like this happened was in 2005.

"We were surprised. We knew that there were cold temperatures, we expected a certain amount of damage, but we didn't expect to [this] extent."

"We're still trying to get a handle on this. It makes everything more difficult in the vineyard."

Oppenlaender has been growing grapes for 38 years, he said the effects of these losses can be devastating. 

He said there's extra labour required to try and recover the vines where possible, as well as high demand for material needed for this process. 

"Depending on the extent of the damage, it takes us a couple of years to come back to a full crop and that's providing that Mother Nature will be kind to us over the next couple of winters."

'Mother Nature plays a huge role in our success'

CEO of Wine Growers Ontario Aaron Dobbin said the impact of the climate on grape vines is an issue that has to be addressed year by year.

"We take a lot of precautions, we have the windmills that people will see up in the fields, [we] take care of the vines and prepare them for the winter."

"At the core of our business, we're all farmers. And so Mother Nature plays a huge role in our success."

Wine is a $4.4 billion industry in Ontario, employing over 18,000 people and prompting visits of more than 2.4 million tourists every year.

"If you want to see the impact of wineries on a region, you can just look at the number of people that come to Niagara and stay overnight, and how we see the restaurants and the artists and crafts and bed and breakfasts all built up," Dobbin said.

As farmers, people in the industry are concerned about climate change, he said.

"If we get a stretch of really cold winters … or we get a frost in the spring, that can have very detrimental impacts on the crop, on the grapes."

He said one of the biggest challenges for farmers after losing so many crops is growing new ones.

"It's not like wheat, [where], if you have a bad year, you turn around and you replant next year and you harvest that fall."

"There'll be farmers who will be putting in new plantings. But it takes three to five years for those planters to come to really produce grapes."

As far as what kind of impact this winter damage will have on the Niagara wine industry, Dobbin said it won't be felt by the public — yet.

"We will have enough wine to continue to produce the high-quality Ontario wines, we may just not see as much of it being produced as in the last couple of years."

"It's been very geographically specific, where the impacts have been felt, so there will be a number of growers who will be feeling that [loss]."