Frost Bite Video
IFW Video Diary, May 5, 2008
This short film is a walk in the vineyard with Kathleen Inman at Olivet Grange in Sonoma County's Russian River Valley, the source of Inman Family's estate wines. The Pinot Noir and Pinot Gris in the vineyard was badly damaged by severe cold and frost in April 2008.
At Olivet Grange, the frost protection system is a series of micro-sprinklers that are turned on before the temperature drops below freezing and then as the temperature drops, the water on the plants turns to ice and as the sprinklers continue layers of water form ice cocoons which keep the tender shoots at 32 degrees, which is a temperature the plants can tolerate. When it goes below 30 the plant tissue is permanently damaged. This year, when temperatures dipped very quickly to 24 degrees in parts of the vineyard the water was turning to ice before it coated the plants and the system failed.