07, February 2022

Old-Vines South Australia

Old vines may be a modern concept—or, at least, a distinction born out of modern viticulture, post phylloxera. According to Chester Osborn, who has collected old-vine parcels to build on his family’s d’Arenberg estate in McLaren Vale, vines planted on their own roots can survive for centuries in the dry conditions at his vineyards. It is largely the failure of the graft between the rootstock and the scion that creates what modern viticulturists consider the vine’s 40-year lifespan.

Words by Joshua Greene
Published by Wine & Spirits Magazine
February 7, 2022