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Using a phone to record a vine shoot in the canopy

How to scale regenerative vineyard management
How to scale regenerative vineyard management 740 1120 Sectormentor

Transitioning one vineyard from conventional to regenerative is an incredibly intricate and challenging process. If you are a regenerative-focused vineyard management company, now extend that to multiple clients.

Your clients are keen to see regenerative transformation, but if your team are collecting data without a unified framework, you’re probably missing the full picture of what’s actually happening; let alone a clear plan for each vineyard’s unique situation.

Having fragmented data, along with owners’ eagerness to see regenerative outcomes, is the pressure point where costly mistakes can occur. As Jordan Lonborg, viticulturist at Coastal Vineyard Care Associates (CVCA), advises: you must see regenerative techniques as end goals, not decisions to be rushed into. 

Enthusiasm without a baseline causes damage

When you move too quickly and apply practices without slowing down to learn and understand the vineyard’s ecology, the results are rarely regenerative. Jordan Lonborg recalls a cautionary tale of a client who, in their excitement to implement new practices, brought 300 sheep onto a property before the infrastructure or the biology was ready. On Jordan’s next visit, only a few days later, he found it very difficult to get his spade into the ground due to the soil compaction caused by the animals grazing in one area for too long. Jordan describes feeling shocked by how quickly you can lose years of hard work:

“It’s shocking how quickly things can go wrong; we’re talking within 2-3 days, where there may be quite a bit of rebound time. It was an eye-opening moment for the property owners, where they had the best of intentions of doing this regenerative practice that everybody talks about, but they didn’t understand the potential for a very negative outcome.”
– Jordan Lonborg, Coastal Vineyard Care Associates

The high cost of not knowing

Without observation, data records, and baselines for each vineyard client, you could run the risk of investing time and energy into practices that are incompatible with specific vineyards. For instance, Jordan notes how simply putting in a cover crop might actually work against vine health and nutrition depending on your context and what is compatible for those specific soils.

Enterprise Vineyards, a regenerative management company based in Sonoma, California, emphasise that a single visual indicator can be dangerously misleading without context. For example, a vineyard scout might spot a red leaf and immediately suspect a virus or a nutritional deficiency, potentially triggering an expensive and unnecessary intervention. In reality, the root cause could simply be localised shoot damage from recent high winds – a detail easily missed if it wasn’t recorded.

Abby Rose’s Observation Framework Loop

To manage regenerative vineyards at scale, you need a system which can take you from guesswork to framework. Drawing on the expertise of our own Abby Rose, Sectormentor’s Co-Founder, we suggest using her favourite observation framework loop:

Observe → Record → Respond → Refine

This loop turns observation into actionable knowledge. Over time, you spot patterns earlier, you act with more confidence, and you build towards the long-term goal: steady yields, thriving vineyards, inspired customers, and a successful and truly regenerative vineyard management company. 

Examining a cover crop plant with a group in the vineyard

Sectormentor as your foundation and structure

How to put the observation framework into action? Sectormentor provides the foundation and structure. Think of it as stablisers for a consistent and shared observation framework as a team. Whether it’s earthworm counts, infiltration tests, or phenology dates, Sectormentor ensures that every team member is synchronised.

Both Vinescapes and Vineworks, two vineyard management consultancies with clients across the UK, demonstrate this; every team member uses Sectormentor daily, giving visibility on what’s happening across all managed sites, whether you’re in the vineyard or the office. This is the observation framework loop operationalised to a vineyard management company scale.

“From phenological dates to disease scouting to yield estimates, all throughout the year we’re constantly populating Sectormentor with information. It really helps me to manage and consult with real-time information on every vineyard I work with.”
– Rob Poyser, Vinescapes

Vineyard management company Sectormentor organisation view photos.
See what your team members are recording in photo uploads; all eyes on every vineyard without having to be on-site.
Visualise phenological data across multiple vineyard client sites in the Sectormentor organisation dashboard.
EACH VINEYARD'S PHENOLOGICAL DATES CAN BE OVERVIEWED AND COMPARED TO OTHER CLIENT SITES.

“We have scouts that go out to the vineyard, and they might go and walk around and take a load of photos, and do a load of observations, and then someone in the office can just click through, and we get a really good overview of all of our vineyards, all at once. You can kind of dive in a bit deeper, or you can just get an overview, like, ‘everywhere seems to be flowering around now.’ It just allows different people to get eyes on all sorts of elements of the vineyards that we look after.”
– Tom Reid, Vineworks

This also creates a culture of internal accountability. As Rob from Vinescapes notes, when the team sits down to review results, the data “refocuses the mind.” You are held accountable to the soil health improvements you committed to, backed by data that everyone can view.

Evidence of regeneration for both your business and clients

Instead of fragmented reports and spreadsheets, all your data for each vineyard client lives in one place. Soil labs, regen indicator results, and field photos create a holistic picture of each site. This builds a historical narrative for every block. When a vineyard owner asks why you aren’t grazing yet, you can show them the infiltration data and the current soil health scores. You can point to the baseline and explain why the site isn’t ready for that step yet.

Having data records of each block fulfils the ‘respond’ step of the observation framework loop; for companies like Vinescapes, the ability to see which cover crop mixes are performing across different soil types, or how different pruning strategies are affecting sap flow across the portfolio, is game-changing:

“The point of making soil health observations is to act on them, to really measure improvements or to measure when things aren’t going right and how we’re going to improve them… We can measure, look back and record what’s working and what’s not working. We can then look at all of our vineyards and switch between accounts… that is just, really, really game changing for us.”
– Rob Poyser, Vinescapes

The Sectormentor regen platform dashboard open on a tablet
The Regen Platform tracks and benchmarks your soil health results, giving you tailored advice from Nicole Masters on how to improve problem areas.
Vineyard management team using a shared data framework across multiple regenerative sites.
The vine health indicator showcases trends in pruning weights, % of short shoots, vine vigour and number of dead vines to monitor the health of each block, allowing you to spot issues years before they become visible on the vineyard.

The positive outcomes for your business

For a vineyard management company, being able to provide proof of progress is a commercial and reputational win across your entire portfolio. Even further, if you can detect a vine health issue before it’s visible in the canopy, or an issue with your cover crop and soil compatibility, then you’ll save time and money, while keeping clients happy and vineyards nurtured.

Similarly, being able to keep vineyard clients ‘in the know’ alongside your work is crucial; this prevents any hasty action, like Jordan’s grazing story. Vinescapes work collaboratively with their clients, so that they can eventually take over management with a more informed knowledge of their land; this is not only regenerative farming, but a regenerative business model.

Take the first step: our free 7-day Regenerative Viticulture Course

The shift to regenerative viticulture begins with a change in how your team document what they see on the land.

We invite you and your team to sign up for our Free 7-Day Regenerative Viticulture Course. This course is designed to be an entry point to understand the foundational methodology: how to start implementing baselines, using key metrics, and integrating the observation framework loop.

Before you change what you do on your vineyards, change how you see them.

Regenerative-viticulture-course


Learn to Grow Resilient Vines
and Quality Grapes with our free, 7-day email course.

Send Me Lesson #1

If you’re running a multi-site vineyard operation and want to explore whether Sectormentor fits the way your team works, get in touch at info@vidacycle.com, or book a demo here. 


Turn Your Observations Into a

Stronger and Healthier Vineyard

Clear Yield Forecasts

Confident Harvest Plans

Credible Ecological Monitoring

See how Sectormentor works for you:

Small & Medium Vineyards Large Vineyard Vineyard Management Company
The Sectormentor yield predictor open on a laptop and phone
Vineworks team member using Sectormentor to scout a UK vineyard across multiple client sites.

How Vineworks coordinates scouting, pruning, and planning across 20+ vineyard sites
How Vineworks coordinates scouting, pruning, and planning across 20+ vineyard sites 1256 1094 Sectormentor

If you run a vineyard management company, you might be familiar with scattered spreadsheets, photos in numerous camera rolls, and each season’s data spread between multiple folders. Multiply that across ten or twenty client vineyards, and you’ll find that the time it takes to coordinate everything starts to eat into the time you should be spending in the vineyard.

Vineworks is a UK-based vineyard management consultancy responsible for the planting, maintenance, and profitability of multiple vineyard sites all over the UK. Tom Reid, their Head of Vineyard Services, manages operations across all of those sites. We spoke to him about how his team use Sectormentor to streamline their team coordination; from daily scouting, through to the big pruning decisions that shape each vineyard’s productivity and yield.

One platform for every site

For a company managing multiple vineyard clients, each with different varieties, terroirs, and priorities, you need a tool that is flexible and customisable, designed for multi-person use, and works out in the field with no signal and muddy hands. 

What Vineworks needed was a platform they could shape to fit their operation rather than the other way around. As Tom puts it:

“We were looking for something really simple, and really customisable at the same time. With Sectormentor’s help we’ve been able to customise it, but still keep the simplicity of a data entry app, which is critical for us.”

A vineyard management tool has to fit into everyone’s schedules; if it requires training, workarounds, or needs your team to collect metrics they don’t find useful, it starts to take time out of everyone’s day. Vineworks cherry-pick the metrics that matter for each client and each season, keeping data entry fast and the outputs immediately useful.

Autumn vineyard rows above a thick green cover crop
Photo uploaded by Vineworks team to Sectormentor: 'Mowing need: 3: Medium (10cm)'
Vineworks team member using Sectormentor to scout a UK vineyard across multiple client sites. Photo uploaded to Sectormentor to track vine disease and health.
Photo uploaded by Vineworks scout to Sectormentor: 'General disease: 1: No disease. Notes: Nice clean wood'

Full visibility on every vineyard, from field to office

In multi-site vineyard management, no single person can be everywhere at once; Vineworks has scouts in the vineyards throughout the week, recording observations, photographing canopy development, and flagging issues as they find them. The challenge is ensuring that key information reaches the rest of the team promptly and in a format that is easy to interpret.

Sectormentor’s map layout gives the team a spatial view of each vineyard; detailing what was recorded and where. Tom describes using the bird’s-eye view to check whether his scouting practice was representative of the whole site:

“The map update makes it much, much easier for us to scout a vineyard quickly and effectively. We can look at the map and see how representative we’re being when we walk a vineyard, because you get a bird’s-eye view of yourself moving through the field.”

Back in the office, anyone on the team can review the latest observations without having to chase someone for an update. Photos, data, and notes from that morning’s scouting are already synced and uploaded into the system, organised by site:

“Our scouts will walk a vineyard, take lots of photos and make lots of observations. In the team time, back in the office someone else can click through, and we have a really good overview of all of our vineyards, all at once. Depending on what we’re looking at, we can dive in a bit deeper, or we can see simple trends, like ‘everywhere seems to be flowering around now.’ It allows different people to get eyes on all sorts of elements of the vineyards that we look after.”

For Vineworks, Sectormentor helps the team to spot patterns early across all of their vineyards and get organised about pruning and harvest planning. When everyone is working from the same picture, the quality of decision-making improves and the time spent chasing updates goes down.

Vineyard Management Company Sectormentor Dashboard to overview all client sites and activities across the team.
Sectormentor's Dashboard where you can overview all client sites and activities across the team
Phenology tracking in the Sectormentor mobile app
Each vineyard's phenological dates can be overviewed and compared to other client sites.

How pruning decisions get made in December

A crucial moment where both data and team coordination determine the shape of the next three months is the planning window before pruning begins in January. At Vineworks, the team come together to collectively assess each vineyard and how to prune it.

In the weeks before Christmas, the Vineworks team visit each site to carry out winter assessments; they record bud counts and charge counts in particular, which tells them how many buds to keep on each vine to balance yield and quality for the coming season (see Sectormentor’s Vine Health Indicator). Where possible, they’re also collecting pruning weight data, which gives a measure of the vines’ vigour and helps inform how much to prune. All of this contributes towards a collaborative planning session that sets the schedule for January onwards:

“Before Christmas we do all of our planning for pruning. The team will be out doing their winter assessments for the vineyards. At this stage we’re looking at what degree of pruning we’re going to do to each site, which can become quite a collaborative moment. We discuss the results of these assessments (pruning weights, charge counts etc.) and plan out what type of pruning we’re going to do at each vineyard, which then dictates the schedule for our pruning and has a really big impact on our next three months of work. It’s really critical for us to have data that’s easy to interpret, and then we can make a plan accordingly.”

When each vineyard’s data is all in one place, comparable across sites, easy to pull up and interrogate together, the team can focus on the decisions themselves; which vineyards need conservative pruning, which can carry more buds, and how to allocate team members across the full schedule. 

For a consultancy whose reputation depends on getting those decisions right for every client, the planning infrastructure behind them matters as much as the viticulture knowledge that informs them.

If you’re running a multi-site vineyard operation and want to explore whether Sectormentor fits the way your team works, get in touch at info@vidacycle.com. 


Turn Your Observations Into a

Stronger and Healthier Vineyard

Clear Yield Forecasts

Confident Harvest Plans

Credible Ecological Monitoring

See how Sectormentor works for you:

Small & Medium Vineyards Large Vineyard Vineyard Management Company
The Sectormentor yield predictor open on a laptop and phone

Roebuck Estates: How to be regenerative, save time and money, and produce quality grapes
Roebuck Estates: How to be regenerative, save time and money, and produce quality grapes 1795 1271 Sectormentor

We recently visited Roebuck Estates, a sparkling wine producer with multiple sites across Sussex, who are currently transitioning their vineyards to more ecological practices while still producing high quality grapes. Roebuck use Sectormentor to track progress of the transition and monitor vine health across their multiple sites.

Managing the transition to herbicide free with Sectormentor

In the last few years, Roebuck have eliminated their use of herbicides on all of their sites which has resulted in a dip in vine vigour and lower yields. Jake told us that this has been a challenging time for the Roebuck team, as they haven’t been able to accurately predict their yield estimates due to the changes in vigour. 

“We’re really in a bit of a transition phase where my calculation from lag phase and veraison to harvest hasn’t worked. Looking back, what the actual calculation was versus the weights at lag phase to what they were when we picked them has declined massively. It is, and it will kind of even itself out. The vines will find a balance again. By our management methods, and by our pruning methods, we will find a happy medium for them.”

This transition is being monitored by the Roebuck team in Sectormentor. Jake tracks charge counts and shoot numbers across blocks, comparing the data year on year to see how the vines are responding to the changes they’re making on the vineyard. Jake uses the Bunch Weights Report to visually demonstrate the drop in yield across the transition years. The data they’re logging is helping Jake to manage expectations around yield while monitoring vine health, and therefore ensuring quality grapes.

‘We’re able to visualise and create a picture of what’s actually going on in our vineyards and individual blocks. It’s better than what we would do on a generic spreadsheet; the report output is very good, and it’s visual. I can use it for Board presentations or team day presentations, I think it’s really helpful and, you know, useful.’

Chart of average bunch weight at harvest across seasons in the Sectormentor webapp
Chart of average shoots per vine across seasons in the Sectormentor webapp
Sun rising over a vineyard row
Pile of pruned canes gathered on the grass in a vineyard alley
Vine trunk with old pruning wounds before the new season growth

“It’s quite interesting to see how our bunch weights at lag phase and veraison have decreased over the years; and the relationship between the bunch weights at lag phase and harvest was really interesting for everyone to see. Visually, it’s quite powerful, we can say ‘look, this is what we’ve done, we’re in our third year of no herbicide, and this is the effect of what has happened.’”

The Roebuck team are also using Sectormentor to track changes in soil health. Jake notes that they’ve already seen a definite increase in earthworm activity since moving to organic fertilisers and eliminating herbicides; a measurable win for their soil health. 

Tracking and evidencing increasing biodiversity on-site

In parallel to their transition away from herbicide use, Roebuck have begun extensively monitoring on-site biodiversity with their in-house ecologist, Matt Howard. The move away from herbicides has already paid dividends in terms of biodiversity: rare plants like the Common Spotted Orchid, typically only seen in the neighbouring ancient woodland on the Little Brockhurst site, have begun migrating onto the vineyard floor.

Matt is using Sectormentor to track these changes in biodiversity; He plans to GPS tag and log detailed survey data for all the habitat boxes and Reptile Refugia mats he uses to monitor species, like the slow worm and common lizard. This saves him time, compared to writing in a notebook and transferring data to a separate spreadsheet, and ensures the biodiversity data is robust and comparable year-on-year.

This eco-system data helps the vineyard team to make management decisions:

“We’ve got between 60 and 70 species within the vineyard… If I survey next year, and we’ve only got 25, we have done something seriously wrong with our management practices.”

Wooden marker post set in a mulched vineyard row

One of Matt's Reptile Refugia mats, due to be GPS located in Sectormentor

Low sun over vineyard rows with grassed alleys

“We believe here at Roebuck estates that if we’ve got a healthy environment, a diverse environment around our estates, it’s only going to benefit what’s going on in the vines and what fruit we’re producing.”

Tracking disease, targeted spray programmes and saving money

The Roebuck team also use Sectormentor to track disease observations and pest traps, like the Brown Apple Moth, across the vineyards. This means that the team can have an idea of any problem areas, and the reasons behind their underperformance. Jake also notes how this saves money:

“I think it genuinely does save money… We’re in a position where we can identify where disease is, so we can implement a specific spray programme for that area and not have to worry about other parts of the vineyard. This saves us money on inputs.”

The convenience of having Sectormentor data to hand

With multiple sites, a team of staff, and numerous ongoing experiments, a central data platform has been supportive for Roebuck’s operation. 

“We don’t realise how much we use it, because it’s just become integrated into our vineyard routine… The fact that everyone can input data from where they are… and it’s instant! The team is out in the field logging changes and observations, and I can look at it when I’m at the desk immediately and start to make decisions about management.”

Jake also notes that, having instructions in the app that you are able to view when logging data or soil tests, means that he feels confident that the data being collected is standardised and is consistent. 

“Everyone’s doing it the same. So the data is as robust as possible.”

A huge thank you to Jake, Matt, and the whole Roebuck team for sharing their journey with us. Their dedication to using data to drive regenerative decisions is a powerful example of what is possible in the world of English sparkling wine.

If you want to learn more about Sectormentor and how it might support your operation, get in touch at info@vidacycle.com.


Turn Your Observations Into a

Stronger and Healthier Vineyard

Clear Yield Forecasts

Confident Harvest Plans

Credible Ecological Monitoring

See how Sectormentor works for you:

Small & Medium Vineyards Large Vineyard Vineyard Management Company
The Sectormentor yield predictor open on a laptop and phone
Crouching between vine rows to inspect the ground cover and soil surface

Soil health and regenerative experimentation at Vinescapes
Soil health and regenerative experimentation at Vinescapes 2560 1707 Sectormentor

We recently spoke to Rob Poyser, viticulturist at Vinescapes, who won the WineGB Sustainability in Viticulture Rising Star award in 2024. Rob told us a bit about what he and the Vinescapes team are up to,  and how they’re using Sectormentor.

Vinescapes is a UK-based vineyard management and consultancy business providing hands-on and practical guidance to vineyards. They aim to help build long-term successful vineyard businesses, with a focus on harnessing the power of data and enhancing natural eco-systems for vineyard health and productivity.

The Vinescapes Approach

“We manage land on behalf of our clients from Cornwall all the way through to East Anglia, so it’s a lot of ground to cover. We’re constantly having regular team meetings. We share technical information, knowledge, we do a lot of internal training; it’s important that we upskill each other. And we spend a lot of time crop walking and disease scouting, out in the field, in the vines, which is super important as a team.”

Taking a collaborative approach has been key to Vinescapes’ success as a business and team, “it’s all about constant communication”. Knowledge sharing and upskilling each other has helped Vinescapes to grow, adapt, and come up with solutions together. In this way, they are able to build real experience and expertise as a team. This approach also extends to their relationships with vineyards and clients:

“Our collaborative approach with clients means we’re not only there to just deliver them fruit, but we’re there to help them over their long-term journey; to grow a successful vineyard business that will keep on performing. It’s this bigger picture, so to speak, not just getting a crop this year. We work with our clients every day to make real-time decisions.”

Person standing between vine rows holding a spade for soil sampling
Vinescapes’ Rob Poyser won WineGB’s Rising Star Award in 2024 for Sustainability in Viticulture.

How Vinescapes prioritise monitoring day-to-day

The Vinescapes team have a focus on spending time in the vines, disease and pest scouting client vineyards and crop walking, to build an intimate knowledge of each vineyard, and quickly solve problems as they arise. They have found Sectormentor invaluable as a framework to support this approach, making it easy to track and record vineyard data whilst sharing it with vineyard teams. This allows vineyards to be “in the know” and to learn alongside Vinescapes; “they get detailed reports every couple of weeks, every time we visit, which can be as detailed or data driven as they like”. Vinescapes also offers training, so clients can eventually manage the vineyard themselves with a more informed knowledge of their land.

Everyone on the Vinescapes team has access to Sectormentor and uses it every day. This allows the team to be co-ordinated, through having visibility on what everyone is up to, whether team members are in the office or out in the field. 

“I think that’s the key; from phenological dates to disease scouting to yield estimates, all throughout the year we’re constantly populating Sectormentor with information. It really helps me to manage and consult with real-time information on every vineyard I work with.”

Having vineyard data readily available helps the Vinescapes team to make quick and informed decisions about management practice. This is useful, for example, when it comes to the run up to harvest; at that time of year the team have meetings to discuss which vineyards will be harvested at what time, “we have a master schedule up and we talk about when we’re going to harvest specific vineyards based on the information we’ve put into Sectormentor. It’s super helpful to have it in the run up to harvest, it’s where Sectormentor comes into its own.”

The team have also been using Sectormentor to integrate with other vineyard technology, such as Sencrop weather stations. By linking weather data to Sectormentor, Vinescapes receives detailed GDD (Growing Degree Day) reports from each vineyard in real time helping them to: “learn more about the actual climatics happening in the field.”

Crouching between vine rows to inspect the ground cover and soil surface
The team at Vinescapes conduct regular soil inspections to evaluate soil health and conduct earthworm and biodiversity counts. All of this data is recorded in Sectormentor and is openly shared with clients to make the best decisions for soil and vine health and productivity improvements.

Building soil health across multiple sites

Vinescapes track soil health results to improve vine health and resilience, paying particular attention to areas in need of improvement. The team have all learned how to do Sectormentor’s Regen Indicators, using earthworm counts as a key measure of overall soil health and biology. The team also records flora and fauna species in spring, as this often directly relates to how the vines will perform later in the season.

“We’re a bit obsessive over soils… we record soil health data at least twice a year. We split the vineyards up into blocks based on clones and rootstocks, and we actually dig soil pits in every single one! The point of making soil health observations is to act on them, to really measure improvements or to measure when things aren’t going right and how we’re going to improve them.”

Soil lab testing have also helped Vinescapes plan their programmes for soil nutrition. They take soil samples and send them off for lab nutrient analysis regularly, “In a strange way, it refocuses the mind so you make vineyard management decisions that are going to improve soil health, because you’ll be held accountable at the end of the year when we all sit down and look at each other’s results.”

Regenerative experimentation

Having all vineyard data accessible and in one place has been key to Vinescapes’ ability to challenge viticultural conventions and see how they can do things differently: “Sectormentor is great for research projects because we can measure, look back and record what’s working and what’s not working. We can then look at all of our vineyards and switch between accounts… that is just, really, really game changing for us”.

“We’ve been working with Alistair on collecting data for international projects. It’s been fun to really push the boundaries of what’s possible [with viticulture], internationally and here in the UK; and taking on little projects, like looking at ways to actively improve under vine strips… It’s not just daily, tractor driving or crop walking – we are making real change to the soil and vine health of clients vineyards.”

Thank you to Rob for chatting to us about how the Vinescapes team use Sectormentor. If you are an run a vineyard, are a vineyard consultant or vineyard management company and are interested in learning more about Sectormentor, contact us at info@vidacycle.com, or book a demo with us here.


Turn Your Observations Into a Stronger and Healthier Vineyard

Clear Yield Forecasts

Confident Harvest Plans

Credible Ecological Monitoring

See how Sectormentor works for you:

Small & Medium Vineyards Large Vineyard Vineyard Management Company
The Sectormentor yield predictor open on a laptop and phone
Tall flowering yellow cover crop growing in the alleys between vine rows

Guest Post: A practical comparison of the financial and ecological benefits of biodiversity at two sites in the UK
Guest Post: A practical comparison of the financial and ecological benefits of biodiversity at two sites in the UK 2560 2560 Sectormentor

A tale of two approaches: a guest post
by Joel Jorgensen (Vinescapes)

A practical comparison of the financial and ecological benefits of biodiversity at two sites in the UK

As a team of advisors and contract vineyard managers at Vinescapes, we are grateful to have a unique birds-eye-view of the UK vineyard sector and we’re certainly noticing some trends, myths and interesting observations. 

One such observation was the positive impact that a healthy soil (and I mean truly healthy, not just chemically balanced and well drained) can have on the vines, especially with regards to their health, yields, required inputs and resilience. 

To highlight an example, we have two sites with similar terroir, that have historically been managed in very different ways, partly due to their setup and partly just management preferences. Both sites are South facing, well drained on medium textured sandy clay loam soils with good shelter from prevailing winds, sufficient air flow and very little shading. 

Site A was established many years ago on Geneva Double Curtain (GDC) trellising, which was popular at the time, while site B is Guyot pruned on VSP (Vine Trellis System). This is where the management differences (all human intervention rather than natural) start. 

The ‘T’ shaped trellising of GDC in site A has guaranteed no tractor traffic on the vines’ rootzone for many years, and it has suffered no compaction at all. Therefore, no subsoiling or inter-row cultivation was needed. No cover crops were planted but the naturally diverse flora population has been left to seed regularly over the years. During early season, the naturally taller vines don’t suffer from lack of airflow, despite a taller ground cover. Very few herbicides were used in site A; it was felt that the more vigorous GDC vines could handle some competition, and the taller trunks made it easier to strim or mow under-vine. I’m told spraying was limited to ‘essential only’, where the owners monitored the weather closely and only sprayed when disease was highly likely to appear or already present. 

By contrast, site B has been kept incredibly tidy and immaculate since planting. For the first two years, all competition was cultivated away so nothing could compete with the vines. Vine establishment was quick and strong and root penetration went deep. By year 3, a beautiful ‘golf course’ grass was managed between the rows with a very straight weed-free strip under-vine using a combination of herbicides and mechanical control. The spray program here has always been the prudent option of belt and braces with a minimum of 12 fungicide and nutrition sprays per season.

To recap:

Site A:

  • No compaction 
  • No tilling, subsoiling, cultivating or ploughing for many years 
  • Very little herbicide use
  • Diverse flora mix between the alleys and under-vine
  • Reactive spray program

Site B: 

  • Tidy, short grass between the rows
  • Totally weed free
  • Quick establishment
  • Robust spray program

Inspired by Abby and the team at Vidacycle, Vinescapes’ vineyard managers monitor ground conditions, soil structure and soil biology very closely to better understand what the soil can do for the plants and vice versa.

Interestingly, the average scores over time for sites A and B have been very different since planting. 

 

Site A

Site B
Earthworm counts 26 13
VESS mixed size bobbly crumbs Large angular blocks
Rhizosheaths some roots coated no coating, roots white
Spade-ability Very easy Very hard
Summary Living soil with porous and spongy structure, lots of roots, insects and worm activity. Always moist but never waterlogged.  Ground is just soil. Very few living organisms, few pores and limited drainage. Often over-dry or waterlogged.  

Site A – crumb-like aggregate soil, scoring well on the VESS test

Crumbly dark vineyard topsoil held together by fine roots

Site B – angular blocky soil, scoring poorly on the VESS test

Soil profile in a vineyard pit showing dark topsoil and roots over lighter subsoil

It is clear (confirmed in many other sites) that having less compaction and increased biodiversity within the vineyard, and especially near the vine roots, has a huge impact on the soil structure and food web. Fed by the flora population, the worm, fungal and insect activity within the soil creates a healthy soil structure with increased porosity, resilience, strength, and nutrition. I can’t think of a machine that can replicate this! In practical terms this means less need for subsoiling, artificial drainage, cultivation, or fertilisation.   

2021 was a tough season for many growers; with cooler than average temperatures, lower than average GDD, high and frequent rainfall at times and relatively high disease pressure (Downy and Powdery Mildew, Phomopsis and Botrytis). We were not at all surprised to find Downy Mildew and Botrytis in site B despite frequent fungicide use, while site A remained spotless all season with nearly half of the number of sprays. 

After harvest the soil analysis showed site A was only slightly lacking Phosphorus and Potassium, both of which are removed from the vineyard in the grapes, while Site B was deficient in Nitrogen, Calcium, Magnesium, Iron, Phosphorus, Potassium, Boron, Molybdenum, Zinc and Sodium. This is clearly linked to the soils’ relative Cation Exchange Capacity (CEC) – where site A is climbing past 23, while site B is scoring only 8.5 and was declining. A soil’s CEC can indicate its ability to hold and release (exchange) nutrients in plant available forms. A soil with very low CEC will leach(lose) most synthetic fertilisers quickly while a soil with higher CEC will hold nutrients and release them to the plants as needed. Whilst the CEC is largely dictated by the soil’s texture class (% Sand, Silt, Clay and Organic Matter) it can be improved by increasing the organic matter content thus enhancing the soil food web and effectively improving the soils natural ability to create, hold, and supply nutrients to the vines. All living soil borne organisms play a role in this process and anything that disrupts the soil, also disrupts these organisms. 

Screenshots from Sectormentor’s Earthworm Indicator tool showing the differing earthworm counts at site A & site B against UK benchmarks.
Average count per block plotted against a red, amber and green scale

Site A – higher average earthworm counts per block

Average count per block plotted against a red, amber and green scale, sitting at the low end

Site B – lower average earthworm counts per block

The relative cost differences involved with managing site A vs B are eye watering. The extra sprays, fertiliser inputs, mowing and weed control required in site B drive the management costs to the limits, not to mention the benefits of allowing true terroir to shine through in Site A.

Site B is now on a journey of soil recovery, with improving Brassica mixes sowed with a no-till drill and a lighter tractor purchased to help limit compaction. PAS100 Compost has been spread at 50T/ha and we have stopped using herbicides altogether. We have installed weather stations too, so we can confidently reduce the sprays when safe to do so.

We’re looking forward to seeing how things progress at both sites, and how the soil test results change over time. 

Diverse natural flora at site A

Bee feeding on yellow trefoil and white clover flowers in a vineyard alley

Brassica mix planted in site B to support biodiversity & soil health

Tall flowering yellow cover crop growing in the alleys between vine rows

We are proud to support a number of vineyard consultancies that use Sectormentor to support their work in the vineyard. A number of the consultancies have also started to introduce visual soil monitoring and other regenerative indicators aided by Sectormentor, and we will be telling more of these stories in upcoming months.

We first heard Joel at Vinescapes tell this story at an SWGB meeting, and we thought it was a brilliant demonstration of the importance of soil health observation and the core practices that support regenerative viticulture. It’s great to hear how Sectormentor helps Joel keep track of client account data, and bring together a full picture of vine and soil health. We’re looking forward to seeing how things progress at both sites, and to continue to support the great work that Vinescapes do.

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Pouring water into a mesh basket to run a slake test on vineyard soil

How alive is your soil? Assessing soil health at Bee Tree Vineyard with Vine-Works
How alive is your soil? Assessing soil health at Bee Tree Vineyard with Vine-Works 800 534 Sectormentor

We’re working with vineyards on exploring soil health monitoring and the value it can bring to the enterprise. Bee Tree Vineyard in West Sussex is owned and run by Vine-Works, who also provide a suite of management services from planting through to harvest for vineyards across the UK. They use their 1.5 hectare site of vines to trial new management approaches which they might then apply to vineyards they manage for their clients.

Digging a soil pit between the vine rows

Healthy soil should be brimming with biological life and full of carbon sequestered by a diverse range of plants. Plants exude sugars into the soil through their roots during their vegetative growth, feeding micro-organisms in the soil, which can in turn unlock nutrients for plants to take up when they need them. Micro-organisms also secrete glues and slimes which hold the soil structure together, forming aggregates – the basis of healthy soil. This aggregated structure allows water and air to easily percolate around and through it, so the soil will be able to hold more water deep down in its profile for when plants really need it, as well as remain aerobic.

Hand holding a crumb of vineyard soil with grass roots, assessed for soil structure

Synthetic and chemical inputs such as herbicides and nitrogen fertiliser, as well as turning the soil, can disrupt plant root-soil interactions and hence disrupt feeding the vital soil biology. Vine-Works have been investigating how to reduce reliance on inputs and manage soil biology positively at Bee Tree Vineyard. The Vine-Works team have replaced undervine herbicide usage with a mechanical undervine weeder which they have found very effective. They’re also trying a new type of chicken manure compost pellet made by ‘Cloud-Agro’ to further feed the life in the soil.

Improving soil biology by increasing plant and root diversity is one of the first steps on the journey to reducing inputs in a vineyard. Vine-Works have been trialling different mixes of cover crops with diverse root systems in the rows in between vines to improve soil biology. When we visited Bee Tree Vineyard we chose sample sites to assess soil health based on the different cover crops to see how these have affected soil structure and biology. Bee Tree are one of our first vineyards to start recording soil health observations using Sectormentor. These first tests form their ‘soil health baseline’ so they can understand where their soil is at now and where they want to go in the future.

By comparing between different rows that were next to each other but had been managed slightly differently we were already able to see some stark differences in how the soil was structured and stored water. One row where the cover crop sewed this Spring had never taken performed significantly worse than the neighbouring row with a cover crop that was well established from the year before. It has already enabled Vine-Works to change some of their management strategy, in that they will now plant their cover in Autumn to give it plenty of chance to establish and reduce the risk of bare soil!

We wanted to talk you through exactly what we did, the different tests and what they mean:

Group assessing vineyard soil structure in the alley with a spade

Our first sample site was a block of Cabernet Blanc with a deep rooting cover crop planted in between the rows, including radish, chicory and cocksfoot grass in the mix. These plant species are good at getting roots down into the soil, breaking it up, and bringing nutrients up from below. We saved the exact location of the sample site using GPS coordinates in the Sectormentor app. This means the team can go back to the same place in 6 months or a year and test again to see how things have changed.

Green cover crop in the alley between vine rows with a bare strip under the vines

First we dug out a spade’s width soil pit and visually assessed the soil structure (VESS test) for both under the vines and in the row. Under the vines the soil structure was quite blocky, but it did break down relatively easily in one hand. It was slightly better in the row under the cover crop, where the first inch of soil in the rooting area was nicely aggregated, but the clay got harder and blockier as we moved down the profile.

Examining a spadeful of vineyard soil during a soil health assessment

Next we did a Slake test, submerging 1p sized bits of the soil in a sieve in water and observing how quickly it broke down. The soil under the cover crops did well in the slake test, only losing around 20% of its structure. If the soil is alive with micro-organisms the structure will be held together with glues and slimes they secrete, and so it will not break down so much in water. If the soil is held together by compaction, it will break down easily. This test gives you an idea for biological life in the soil and how much soil could be running off your vineyard in heavy rain.

Two soil aggregates sitting in water-filled sieves during a slake test in the vineyard

Finally we did Infiltration Rate test by knocking a 150mm tube into the ground and pouring in an inch of water. This gives an idea for how easily water can percolate into the ground and be stored there, instead of running off and into water courses. The infiltration rate was very slow under the vines, suggesting water can easily run off from this area. However it infiltrated faster into the cover crop, which is good news as it  suggests rain water will be better stored in the soil for drier periods when the plants need it. The Vine-Works team used Sectormentor to record all these results so they can start to compare them with other sample sites across the vineyard.

Digging beneath a vine to take a soil sample, with an infiltration ring on the ground

Next we headed next to a block of Pinot Noir with a different cover crop in between the vines, a mix including clover and trefoil. Clover is a legume and has the capacity to fix nitrogen in the soil on nodules on its roots. Here we found the cover crop had not established as well as the deeper rooting cover we previously tested.

Dense green cover crop growing in the alley between vine rows

There was much more bare soil in the row, which means there are no living roots feeding the soil in these places and the soil is more at risk of running off with heavy rain. The Vine-Works team recorded the % of bare soil, broadleaves, grasses and undesirables in the Sectormentor app, so they can assess how well they are improving plant diversity. We dug out a soil block and instantly noticed how much drier and blockier it was than the soil at the first sample site. It was harder to break down with one hand, breaking up into angular blocks. So, it didn’t score as well on the VESS test as the first site!

Vineyard worker breaking apart a soil clod beside a dug hole to assess structure

Now onto the slake test, placing 1p pieces of soil into water; due to the high clay content in the soil it held together relatively well, but still broke down more than the first sample site, losing more than 30% of its structure, showing that there is less biological life in this soil.

Pouring water into a mesh basket to run a slake test on vineyard soil

We really struggled to get the infiltration rate tube into the ground, showing compaction issues, which were corroborated by the very slow infiltration rate both in the row and under the vines. The Vine-Works team recorded all the soil test results and the GPS location of the pinot noir sample in Sectormentor; in the future they will be able to see the sample site on the map and get back to it easily to test again and see if things have improved.

Slake test kit laid out in the vineyard with a mesh basket, a bowl of water and a wooden board

At the second sample site the lack of establishment of the cover crop had clearly affected the soil health in that part of the vineyard, whereas at the first sample site the soil biology had started to get going. It was exciting to see so clearly how the different cover crops had affected soil health, allowing the Vine-Works team to understand what’s happening below ground and make decisions on how to move forward with improving soil health. The team went onto sample another site in the Pinot Noir block which had the deep rooting cover crop and did an ‘under the hedge’ test to get an idea for how good the soil could be. For an ‘under the hedge’ test you find a completely undisturbed spot of soil, by a hedge or in a woodland, which has not had any intervention. This will give you an idea for what the soil biology and structure could be like!

“I found the soil health tests very interesting, it’s changing how I think about vineyard management.” – Matt, Vine-Works

So, what’s next on the soil health journey for Vine-Works & Bee Tree? Soil monitoring regularly will help them understand the impact of different vineyard management techniques on their soil health. After varying success at establishing cover crops this season they plan to sow their cover crops this year just after harvest (Oct/Nov) rather than in Spring. From the VESS, infiltration rate and slake tests they could easily see just how negative the impact of bare soil from a poorly established cover crop can be, so by sewing in Autumn it will guarantee plenty of water to get the cover crop established. It was also clear that undervine cultivation was greatly slowing the infiltration time under the vines, so they are much more likely to get serious run off and leaching of nutrients from this soil. They have plans to try alpine plants under the vines next season, which will provide perennial cover and living roots in the soil all year round. These are hardy plants which do not need reseeding, so it’s an exciting trial!

In the autumn the team will be heading out to do earthworm counts, as it was too dry to do them when we visited this time. Earthworms are one of the best indicators of biological life in the soil, as if they are plentiful and present and active, many of the microorganisms will be too.

Find out how Sectormentor helps you monitor soil health in your vineyard & learn how your soil is changing. Contact us if you have questions!

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