08/14/08 West Side Riesling

West Side Riesling. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. Gary Moulton with WSU's Northwestern Washington Research & Extension Center in Mount Vernon has spent considerable time researching wine grapes and how they fare on the west side of the state. Riesling is one of the more popular white wines traditionally grown in Germany and according to Moulton is being looked at. MOULTON: We're trying some Riesling in some warmer spots in Western Washington but actually haven't made Riesling yet but there's some things in Germany that they're looking at like Kerner and Ehrenfeltzer that I don't want to say they are Riesling replacements but they're Riesling types that ripen a lot earlier and those are the types of things we are tying here. Moulton points out that the Puget Sound region has similar growing conditions to Germany. MOULTON: We do have quite a bit of difference in mezzo-climates in heat units and we're right next to the Puget Sound and our heat units are considerably lower than when you get up all these river valleys. You get away from the Sound and you get a lot warmer summers. Moisture also plays a big factor in the west side climate. MOULTON: We're not as dry as Germany however our driest part of the year is usually after the 4th of July to about the middle of October so actually we can get rains but if you do a good job on canopy management we're not any  we probably have less rain than Burgundy, France. Look for some interesting varieties to come out of Western Washington in the next couple of years. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.