Prepared and equipped in a specific way, they work promptly at the request of companies with dendrosurgery, a literally "surgical" technique, which the Vine Master Pruners have developed in recent years to counteract the deleterious effects of esca, the more serious and widespread disease affecting vineyards all over the world, and especially European ones.
"Trivially, we can compare our intervention to what a dentist does to treat a caries - explains Marco Simonit - Using small electric chainsaws, we open the trunk and export the part affected by the sore bait. The plant" detoxified "from the disease, it regains vigor in a short time, starts to bear fruit and becomes fully productive. There are no effective products to cure sore bait, even if a lot of research is being done in this regard. Only two things to do: prevention with a proper pruning and timely surgery as soon as the plants begin to show the first symptoms. "
The results achieved in 10 years of work and experimentation in Italian and French vineyards and in various important wine-growing areas of the world are surprising: 90% of the treated plants are fully productive again. A result of great importance, both for the quality of the wines and for the economic impact . In fact, by uprooting the diseased vines and replacing them with new cuttings, a disparity in the quality of the grapes is created in the vineyard which obviously affects the quality and quantity of the wine: having the longest-lived plants possible is a priority requirement for all winemakers, but above all for the most important international Maisons, since it guarantees the qualitative continuity and recognition of their great wines. Dendrosurgery also allows companies considerable savings , since the cost of replanting is avoided (uprooting of diseased vines, excavation of holes, planting of rooted cuttings, breeding) and the lack of production by new plants for at least 6 years is obviated.
The first tests of dendrosurgery were made by Simonit & Sirch in 2011 at Chateau Reynon in the Bordeaux area, then by Schiopetto in Friuli and by Bellavista in Franciacorta. In 10 years of work and experimentation, 15,000 plants of 12 varieties (Sauvignon blanc, Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Sauvignon, Pinot nero, Riesling, Malvasia Istriana, Sangiovese, Gruener Veltiner, Carmenere, Malbec) have been operated in vineyards of 12 wine-growing regions : Collio, Franciacorta, Montalcino, Champagne, Burgundy, Bordeaux, Mendoza, Kamptal, Steiermark, Pfalz, Istria and Maipo in Chile. Analyzing the data collected - and also validated by the University and the INRA Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique de Bordeaux - it appears that tree surgery slows down the progression of mortality symptoms of infected plants and that, despite the operated plants show a slightly lower vigor and fertility than healthy plants, the quality of the grapes is comparable . It is not the same for non-operated infected plants.
"As an example - Simonit points out - suffice it to say that in 6 years (from 2011 to 2017) 90% of the plants of the Sauvignon bianco cultivar operated in Friuli have returned to production, and if before 2011 they were replaced due to illness '4.3% per hectare comes out, after 2017 the percentage dropped to 0.07%. "
"It all started years ago, when we thought about experimenting with dendrosurgery, described by Ravaz and Lafon as practiced since ancient times and applied by Poussard at the end of the 1800s with very encouraging results, i.e. 90-95% of recovered strains - he concludes - Thanks to the interest of Prof Denis Dubourdieu, former director of the ISVV Istitut des Sciences de la vigne et du vin of the University of Bordeaux, who died prematurely, we have put it into practice with modern tools. We were the first ever to do so. , both in Italy and abroad . We are absolutely satisfied with these results, but we will not stop here, because ours is a work that is always in progress. We are verifying, for example, what is the best time of the year to intervene, with how often do we have to do it, how many plants can a person operate per day, how long the plants we operate remain asymptomatic and other various factors. "
