Adelaide Hills Vineyard Manager Craig Markby is passionate about plants. Originally from Victoria, Craig moved to South Australia in 2006 to work with the Henschke family who have been leaders in sustainable viticulture for decades.
Finalist in the 2024 Vinehealth Australia Biosecurity Champion Award, Craig oversees all operations at Henschke’s cool-climate Lenswood site.
“My interest in viticulture stemmed from dropping out of a metallurgy course and I ended up in a little family grocery store and bottle shop in suburban Melbourne,” Craig said.
“The bottle shop owner was very keen on wine, and we would get to meet the winemakers and taste all their wines. That’s where I got hooked on the wine industry.
“But I was always most interested in plants. So, ultimately, I thought if I could combine agriculture with wine, that would be the ideal scenario.”
That led to a wine marketing course at Roseworthy College (now the University of Adelaide), followed by a viticulture degree at Charles Sturt University, winning the Tucker-Seabrook Prize as the top graduate with numerous citations for academic excellence along the way.
Meanwhile, Craig’s wine industry career had started with McGuigan Wines and Wyndham Estate in the Hunter Valley. “I was working three jobs, doing cellar door and stick cutting for the McGuigan’s who were doing a big vineyard expansion, and doing vineyard work with Wyndham Estate,” he said.
“I moved up the ranks and, in the end, I was Vineyard Operations Manager for the Lower Hunter for Pernod Ricard. But as it happens, the higher I moved up, the more desk bound I became, and I hadn’t studied viticulture to sit at a desk.
“I saw a vineyard job advertised for Henschke and I took the job sight unseen, essentially because I was drawn to the sustainable way they manage their land. This was before sustainability was even a concept.”
Craig was given free rein to develop the 48 hectare Lenswood site, experimenting with varieties and native pastures, connecting the dots between earth, plants and atmosphere.
“We’re just finishing a project where we’ve just seeded nearly three hectares of native pasture and planted a vineyard on top of it,” Craig said.
“We managed the weeds for three years before we seeded it, and we allowed the grass to grow for a year before we put the vineyard in. So rather than trying to get the vines in and grapes off, we were focused on establishing a good level of native vegetation before planting the vines.
“We’ve focused on melding the native aspects of Lenswood into the vineyard operations. We’re trying to grow the grapes within the native bush, essentially.”
Protecting the vines from biosecurity threats is also a passion for Craig. His mantra is “come clean and go home clean”.
“I think contractors and their picking/pruning crews moving around from site to site are one of the biggest biosecurity risks,” Craig said.
“If the crews are non-English speaking, that adds to the risk as often they are unaware of the vineyard pest and disease problems we have in Australia.
“I sit down with them and have a quiet conversation about biosecurity in a welcoming environment, to educate and empower them. Then they understand why I need them to stand in a chlorine footbath for 60 seconds, and why their equipment must be clean.
“Generally, there’s an English speaker in the group to help with translations and I also use diagrams. Some of them don’t know anything about phylloxera so I show them the picture of phylloxera on a match head and talk about how this tiny thing kills vines and there’s no cure. Their eyes almost pop! Then they’re happy to stand in the footbath. For me, good biosecurity is all about education.”
Craig also has Wine Tourism Biosecurity Signage at all vineyard entry points, asking people not to enter the vineyard, he keeps a log book of visitors and does not import any machinery from interstate.
Henschke Wines is also passionate about sourcing and producing high-health vine material for vineyards.
“I’m vice chair of Adelaide Hills Vine Improvement Inc and treasurer of South Australian Vine Improvement Assoc. There’s a cluster of properties in the Hills, including ours, that are providing high-health material to industry to help maintain a healthy viticulture base, and to support the vine improvement sector,” Craig said.
“With that comes another level of rigour around biosecurity. We are supporting research in hyperspectral Imaging for rapid infield virus testing and the Clonal Grape Vine DNA project with the AWRI for clonal assurance as we work towards developing the National Grapevine Collection.”
Among his volunteer roles for industry is Biosecurity Industry Liaison Officer for the Adelaide Hills Wine Region on behalf of Plant Health Australia and through this, he has completed biosecurity training.
“Being a Biosecurity Industry Liaison Officer for the Hills isn’t onerous, it’s about educating people about biosecurity threats and solutions,” Craig said.
“As an industry, we’re relying on the goodwill of everybody to do the right thing – to not import grapevines in suitcases, to not start a phylloxera outbreak in South Australia. We need to keep educating to help people understand why.
“If we got something really bad like Xylella, there would be quarantine zones where machinery couldn’t be moved out, and all sorts of costs. There is no silver bullet with these serious pests and diseases. We need to keep these pests out.
“Implementing simple biosecurity activities is the responsible and right thing to do.”
