Vintage is a time when there is significant movement of people around grape properties, undertaking activities such as pest and disease monitoring, checking irrigation, maturity sampling, berry tasting to set harvest dates and, of course, harvesting.

Some of these people may have worked in other regions or overseas before visiting your vineyard and could pose a risk of spreading pests, diseases and weeds to your vineyard.

Machinery and equipment movements are also likely to be occurring on and off your property, with machine harvesting involving the use of grape harvesters, tractors, bin trailers and grape bins and the movement of trucks to deliver empty grape bins and take away full grape bins for processing.

Best practice is to ensure all machinery and equipment coming onto your property is clean of soil and grapevine material before it enters, and that it leaves in the same condition.

With these particular activities in mind, take the time now to assess your biosecurity preparedness for #V20 using Vinehealth Australia’s handy Vintage Toolkit, which we constantly update with new information.