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Jeannette Montgomery
Firefighters
Chris Hooydonk of Backyard Farm in Oliver cooked for the Prince George based Firehawks unit.
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Jeannette Montgomery
Firefighters eating
Chris Hooydonk of Backyard Farm in Oliver cooked for the Prince George based Firehawks unit.
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Jeannette Montgomery
Firefighters at Backyard Farm
Chris Hooydonk of Backyard Farm in Oliver cooked for the Prince George based Firehawks unit.
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Jeannette Montgomery
Chris Hooydonk of Backyard Farm
Chris Hooydonk of Backyard Farm in Oliver cooked for the Prince George based Firehawks unit.
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Jeannette Montgomery
Food for Firefighters
Chris Hooydonk of Backyard Farm in Oliver cooked for the Prince George based Firehawks unit.
Winemaking is farming. Growers try to plan each vintage but the success is somewhat out of our control. We can irrigate and fertilize, build game and wildlife fencing, calculate the risks, and purchase crop insurance. Yet in a desert like region one threat is fire, a foe that proves difficult to prepare for.
Kelowna locals remember the Okanagan Mountain Park fire of 2003: it consumed 25,000 hectares, destroyed 239 homes, and forced more than 30,000 people to flee at a moment’s notice. It devastated part of the vineyard at St Hubertus, damaged their crop, and took out the winery building and their house.
Beginning early and in earnest since August 14 this year, fire threat loomed over the south Okanagan. Local agri-tourism businesses saw a drop in numbers as media embellished and misrepresented reports, and a physical cloud of smoke lingered in the valley for days. There is a question on everyone’s mind: what about smoke taint?
Andrew Moon is a viticulturist at Tinhorn Creek Vineyards, and he knows about fire seasons. Moon relocated to the Okanagan from Australia in 2009 and sees similarities between his country of origin and his new home. “We’re in a closed valley, to some extent”, explains Moon. Our arid landscape, resin trees, and close mountains mimic parts of Australia like the King Valley that in 2006/2007 was part of the 1.2 million hectare Eastern Victoria Great Divide Bushfires. They lost $75 - $90M in wine due to unsalvageable crops and ‘smoke taint’.
What the Okanagan experienced so far this season is little compared to the weeks of low hanging dense and acrid smoke that plagued King Valley. “My understanding is you need [the grapes exposed to] smoke for extended periods of time”, explains Moon. “King Valley was socked in for weeks.” However long the exposure to it and whatever the density, most agree the impact of smoke on grapes isn’t readily detected until after fermentation.
Thanks to Mark Krstic and John Whiting of Australia’s Department of Primary Industries , we know something about ‘smoke taint’: two of the compounds are guaiacol and 4-methylguaiacol; grapes are most sensitive seven days after the onset of veraison; repeated exposure has a cumulative effect; the ‘taint’ worsens with age; certain production techniques can help reduce the impact; and it doesn’t affect the next growing season.
The amount of smoke damage depends on the ripening process and the type of grape. “It’s osmosis ”, explains Moon. “From what I know, the compounds travel through the skin membrane to deposit in the grape skin, not the pulp. There are different impacts for red and white grapes, at different stages in ripeness. It varies between varieties.”
Things can be done to help measure and mitigate. Laboratories at some universities accept grapes for testing, so winemakers have a baseline if they see future smoke issues. Plus, Krstic and Whiting’s report theorizes hand harvesting, chilling the grapes post-harvest, and altering the pressing strength and time can help minimize exposure. There’s also a reverse osmosis process for the finished wine. To what degree these processes are effective is unknown, and research is ongoing.
South of Oliver, chef Chris Van Hooydonk watched the Firehawk crew from Prince George spend days battling just beyond his property line. The crew dug trenches, put out hot spots, and waited patiently for air support, each day leaving dirt-covered and exhausted only to return the next morning.
Feeling grateful, the chef did what a chef does: he fed people. On a quiet evening beneath decades-old gnarled peach trees, chef Van Hooydonk cooked for the 19 member Firehawks crew who helped protect his property and that of many others.
We haven’t seen devastation the likes of King Valley, yet our communities rallied to support one another and show gratitude to those who came to our aid. Each year we attempt to control our climate, barricade ourselves from perceived threats, and we recall the previous natural disaster as an outlier.
“We have to look at how to do things differently”, says Andrew Moon. “We need to ask ourselves what impact we’re having on the ecology. Since I’ve been here, we’ve had two of the coldest and now hottest seasons in Canadian history.” He pauses. “We’re going to have to be pretty flexible. The climatic conditions are what’s controlling this – not us.”■
