The Ripe Grape Part 2

The Ripe Grape Part 2. I'm Greg Martin with today's Fruit Grower Report. Yesterday we began a conversation with Washington Wine Grape Growers Vicky Scharlau about knowing when a grape is ripe and ready to pick. An upcoming conference will take a look at this issue. SCHARLAU: And then we've got the issue of ok I might know which grapes are ripe but I have a vineyard that really has challenges in certain areas because of certain reasons and certain soils and certain grape varieties, how do I address that? How do I address and overcome these issues for my particular winemaker and his or her challenges in making a certain wine style. There are of course many different thoughts on when the perfect time is to pick a ripe grape but depending, that can be very subjective. SCHARLAU: There's definitely a science to determine the ripeness of a grape whether it's a table grape, a juice grape or a wine grape but it really depends upon what a winemaker is after in terms of their wine style but also you don't want to have a grape that ends up being beyond the point of ripeness from a scientific perspective. The workshop will be May 13 at the Yakima Convention Center. Contact the association for more information and to sign up. SCHARLAU: So this is really trying to get the two sides of the issue of what is ripe together so that both grower and wine maker can really try to find that perfect center to get the optimum flavor from a grape but get the optimum flavor for the wine style. That's today's Fruit Grower Report. I'm Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.