Viticultural obstacles
Many companies, especially when they have important vineyard areas, make use of mechanical grape harvesters that allow to speed up and streamline the work, sometimes allowing to obtain important savings on the most important for the winegrower.
- By analyzing the limits of this operation, we can undoubtedly find viticultural obstacles :
- The steep slope of the land
- The existence of small terraces or edges makes the machine inoperative
- The lack of access roads
- Unsuitable breeding forms, considering that in Italy until a few years ago we had at least thirty
- Arrangement of branches and shoots
- The height of the logs and posts
- Types of grapes too subject to breaking
- Damage to the plant, piling and wires
The machine undoubtedly is not suitable on low yield particles and where you need to select the production .
There machine undoubtedly it's not convenient on low yield particles and where you need to select the production.
Oenological difficulties
- You cannot do gradual harvests by selecting the ripest bunches
- The grapes arrive in the mashed cellar
- We are unable to carry out carbonic macerations and therefore work with whole grapes
- It strongly limits the choice of winemaking technique especially on whites and rosés
- It almost always leads to an increase in the herbaceous aroma and the bitter taste
- The must is immediately subject to enzymatic and oxidative phenomena
To conclude, we can say that mechanical harvesting is justified for high productions and important surfaces.
If you want to select and you have the possibility to do so, always prefer manual harvesting !!!