On more than one occasion, I have written about how the City of Oakley contracted local grower Alan Lucchesi to excavate and replant a threatened parcel of ancient grapevines in order to guarantee their continued survival.
Christina Rasmussen, owner of Little Wine, wrote an essay on the Oakley Vineyard Transplant Project for Jancis Robinson’s 2021 Wine Writing Contest.
In “Alan’s Alicante”, author Christina Rasmussen details how local vineyard owner and manager Alan Lucchesi and his team went about digging up, transporting, and replanting 2,300 teinturier grapevines.
Jancis Robinson
“WWC21: Alan’s Alicante, California”
by Christina Rasmussen
August 26, 2021
"…Alan [Lucchesi], I discovered, is one of the farmers whose family has been tending vines for decades. In the 1930s, his grandparents emigrated to the United States from Lucca, Tuscany. They bought some land in Oakley, where they planted grapevines, almonds and apricots…It was in 1982 that Fred Cline, one of the grandchildren of Valeriano Jacuzzi, set up Cline Cellars…At the same time, Alan Lucchesi had begun taking the reins from his parents. Alan reflected:
“‘I began working for Fred in 1990; I was just helping him to man a few fields around here, and then I also started to sell some grapes to him. At first, it was just Fred, but soon after Bonny Doon and Ridge started coming into the area.’
“In addition to planting new vineyards in the 90s, Alan also safeguarded the old vines, and leased other vineyards. Today, he farms 700 acres. This might sound like a lot, but it’s estimated that the vineyard plantings of Oakley have diminished by two thirds over the past 100 years, with half of the region’s vineyards having been ripped up since 1980…”.
The author learns how centennarian grape vines were reestablished, in the “Walnut Meadows Vineyard”, a few hundred yards from their original home. Alan Lucchesi relates the circumstances that required uprooting over 2,000 Alicante Bouschet vines, as well as the steps taken by mayor Kevin Romick and city council members to protect the vines.
"…In early March 2011, Alan and a group of fellow workers dug up the 2,300 sleeping beauty Alicante Bouschet vines.
“‘You have to transplant around March - not while they’re growing, or they’ll never make it. You have to do it when they’re still sleeping.’
"Using backhoes, they took the vines out of their original home, and drove them 1.5 miles down the road to their new home—a narrow five-acre patch of land right next to a new housing development. Incredibly, when it came to replanting the vines, the ten-foot holes were dug by hand.
"…The vines’ root systems were between 15 and 20 feet long. As it would have been almost impossible to dig 20-foot holes, some roots had to be trimmed a bit shorter; not all that dissimilar to trimming roots when you receive plants from the nursery.
“‘That’s okay. They still take off. The feeder roots sit higher, and all of the main root balls were still there. It’s the vines themselves that are now 115-years-old, after all. We dug by hand because you need to make sure the vines fit right. You can’t just squish them in, because the roots are all different sizes; like spider legs; you need to dig around them and turn the vines around in the hole. And it’s pretty easy to dig sand, it’s not like hard dirt. You dig that hole pretty fast.’
"…He added that aside from being watered when planted, they are unirrigated, and organically tended.
“‘What was the rate of survival?’ I wondered.
“‘I don’t think we lost a single vine’…".
The City of Oakley originally contracted the vineyard transplant because a power substation was slated to be built where the vines first grew.
In 2007, Antioch’s “Evangelho Vineyard” had lost a parcel of 1,000 vines due to the demands of area growth.
Ironically, in both cases, the infrastructure plans ended up being cancelled!
More on Oakley’s Vineyard Transplant Project:
Wine Berserkers
“Saving Old Vineyards - Economic vs Heritage” thread
Early thread entry about transplantation / “Walnut Oaks Vineyard”
March 7, 2018
“Saving Old Vineyards - Economic vs Heritage” thread
“Vine Transplantation - 10 Years Later?”
August 4, 2021