France to Declare an Agricultural disaster due to the frosts affecting vineyards and crops

The vignerons in Pouilly-Fuisse are saying that they think that they have lost the whole of this year’s crop.
How are they affected in your region?

No problems as far as I can tell in the Var Jane. None of the caves we might slink into for a quick socially distanced degustation have mentioned any concerns.

For Bordeaux (a wine region fairly close to me) so far, so good :crossed_fingers:t4:
but as we know anything can still happen. I love the photo shown here, with the flames amongst the vines.

Fires lit at night among the vines on and off for the last fortnight pretty much, I drove through smoke to work several times. I live in Dordogne and work in Gironde. This cold snap is the worst for 4 or 5 years, usually they happen in May and go down to minus 1 or 2 but now it is down to minus 5 in places.
It is awful for the vignerons (and my formerly lovely kumquat is done for I think).

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Here they are saying they have lost 70%…despite clouds of smoke.

The candles for vineyards may look pretty but they cost a huge amount, and signal disaster for the vignerons so not really something we smile at.

My citronnier :lemon: has been outside soaking up that lovely sunshine we had, but I’ve had to wheel it back inside, for now.
Let’s hope the government steps up and will provide financial aid to those that have lost their crops because of the cold spell.

Our modest vine (delicious seedless green desert grapes) looks wrecked. I think it will come back though, as it has done it before. Let’s hope your kumquat does too.

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I walk the dog through the vines most days - it has been very smokey recently. There is visible damage to some of the vines.

Earlier this week we were woken up by a helicopter hovering over the nearby vines in an attempt to ease the frost.

I’ve lost 3 kumquat’s, hoping that my other citrus plants will be OK.

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I wonder? Wait, for as long as possible. They may surprise you. One year I had huge phormiums and yuccas turn to mush after late snow and was in despair as they had taken years to reach the size they were. I was told to wait and the person who told me was right. They all came back, stronger than before.

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It is rather ironic here as there has been a huge war of words between the vignerons and the agriculteurs as the vignerons have been firing cannons at clouds for the last three years to avoid damaging their vines by hail.
The end result has been that we have been the first area in France to go into a drought situation and there is not enough hay to feed the cattle through the winter.
This year they are not going to be using the cannons as an experiment, but as the weather is so variable who can really predict the outcome.
The drought affects everyone else too, so we are hoping for more rain.

I’m afraid it’s not so far so good here in the Bordeaux appelation some growers have lost fifty to seventy per cent of the future crop. It even killed all the just pollinated fruit on our merisier. Fortunately the mirabelle seems to have escaped.

Our local Marcillac seems OK, but I’m not sure about the Aveyron’s other smaller appellations, like Entraygues-le-fel, whose tiny vineyards are vertiginously high up on the Lot Valley.

Surprised to read this morning that further south, l’Herault vignerons have been hit really hard by much lower temps than we experienced and apparently very few are insured against frost.