Working to Liberate Vines of Phylloxera

Our previous Weekend Wine Word was “phylloxera” and we learned about these diminutive pests that can be capable of destroying an entire vineyard. Not that I am growing my own grapes (yet) it is always nice to see research done to help better the industry. That is exactly what Washington State University is doing.

Richard Cockle over at OregonLive.com has written an article titled Hard to spell, hard to fight which covers the plans over at WSU.

A new research winery near this southeastern Washington farming town is transforming grape growing and wine making, or vinification, into war planning — sort of.

"We want to be prepared if there is an invasion," said James F. Harbertson, a Washington State University enologist, or wine scientist.

Harbertson, 35, is referring to phylloxera, a destructive aphid, or root louse, that preys on grape vines and injects a poison into roots as it feeds, and it could be headed this way. It devastated the great vineyards of France in the 1860s, forcing Europe’s foremost wine-drinking nation to switch to absinthe, a bitter, green liqueur, for a decade or two.

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