California Wine Country Rebuilds as Climate Change and Wildfire Threats Persist nytimes.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from nytimes.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Soot on the base of a vine post-fire in Cornell Vineyards. Photo by Matt Morris.
“The Gamble fire came from the north, 15-10 from the south, and Hennessey from the west they all came here and partied,” says Craig Becker, the proprietor of Somerston Estate in Napa, Calif. The 1,682-acre property saw approximately 1,400 acres of damage, including the loss of 20,000 vines during the LNU Lightning Complex Fire.
Becker is just one of many growers whose vines were damaged during the 2020 wildfires at the peak of harvest. Now, at the start of the 2021 growing season, California’s vintners are once again bracing for another potentially difficult year: Drought emergencies have already been declared in Sonoma and Mendocino counties.