Hard rains in the Napa Valley bring out more than green hills and winter birds. Like the swallows to Capistrano, Bay Area television reporters make their annual Wine Country pilgrimage to perform their periodic “flood” stories.

The image beamed back to urban viewers is always the same: film of the obligatory vineyard with a foot or two of standing water. The commentary is choked with concern for the wet vines, the future of next year’s Cabernet and California’s $33 billion wine industry. But locals know better. The vines are sleeping during winter months, dormant and safe from nature’s hardest blows. During this period it’s difficult not to feel the sense of peace and tranquility they bring to our valley.

But don’t let their blanket of calmness fool you. There’s a whirlwind of activity behind the scenes as winery workers put last year’s harvest behind and prepare for spring. Growing up in the wine industry I remember January and February as a time for sharpening, pruning, trellising, staking, racking and learning. Grinding stones spin overtime to sharpen pruning shears, choppers, tillers, hoe plows and disc blades.

Wilcox Tractor Company used to be the only farm equipment store in town; it stood where the new St. Helena Olive Oil Company is in Rutherford. As a young man I remember working there as well as at Beringer and how busy we were in the winter months getting everything ready for pruning and tractor season.

Contrary to some beliefs, those beautifully manicured rows of vines don’t look that way for the benefit of visiting photographers. There’s an art to properly pruning vines during the winter months to ensure the highest quality of grapes. It takes ten workers roughly two hours to prune 700 vines, the equivalent of a single acre. With more than 32,000 acres of vineyard in Napa County the work is staggering. Like a rose bush, each vine is pruned individually depending on its shape and strengths. The more wood that is removed - pruned - the more vigorous the regrowth. After pruning comes the never-ending job of tying the cordons onto the trellising wires and retying the shoots after they grow.

Between rainstorms you’ll see workers taking advantage of the soft soil by driving in stakes for new vineyards. Hundreds of acres require replanting each year due either to disease or vines that have simply run their course. It takes three years for new vines to bear their first small harvest and many varietals reach their prime only after 25 or 30 years, about the time aging begins to affect their yield.

The majority of the winter work is probably never seen by the public. Thousands of wine-filled barrels are being emptied, cleaned, dried and refilled by hand (called racking). And many who work in the wine industry use the winter to continue their education in viticulture at both our local Napa Valley College and at UC Davis, to keep up with the latest environmental regulations and research.
Unlike other business classes, these professors know better than to teach how to make a product faster or cheaper. Instead they teach us the influences, both great and small, of man and nature on the grapes, and on the importance of knowing your neighbor and having respect for each season of the year.

U.S. Representative Mike Thompson represents California’s First Congressional District, which includes Napa and six other Northern California counties. He is a native of St. Helena.