Growers Spotlight
Bruce England and Big Run Vineyard
Local growers help supply Satek's increasing need for grapes. Periodically we will run a column highlighting one of our grape growers and their vineyard.
Grower: Bruce England
Vineyard: Big Run Vineyard, LLC, Butler, Indiana
Varietals grown: Nearly two acres altogether including: Traminette, Corot Noir, Noiret, Cayuga White, DeChaunac, and NY76.0844.24 (a yet-to-be-named grape variety from Cornell University). In 2011, he harvested 5 � tons of grapes. Bruce will be planting � acre of Marquette this Spring.
Years growing grapes: 14
Family: Married to Auburn native Ellen (Husselman) England
Occupation: retired Pharmaceutical researcher at two small start-up biotech companies in California
Bruce remembers cultivating his interest in wine in the summer of 1973 while a student at Antioch College, during a college chorus tour of Europe, followed by picking grapes in the Pouilly-Fuisse district in France in the Fall of '73. He later attended U.C. Davis in 1978-80 and earned a B.S. in Fermentation Science (Viticulture and Enology), which landed him a job at Wente Winery in Livermore, CA as assistant winemaker for four years. He continued on to do graduate work at U.C. Berkeley and earned a PhD in Biochemistry in 1990.
While living in California he planted 125 Pinot Noir vines in his backyard in 1998. He was able to harvest successful crops in 2001 and 2004, but lost most of the crops in 2002 and 2003 to powdery mildew.
He and his wife Ellen moved to Auburn in 2005 and he purchased Big Run Vineyard in 2006. He planted his first 1 1/3 acres of vines in 2007, and harvested 3 tons in 2009. He says that he most enjoys spending time on his tractor, whether it be mowing, spraying, or planting; and picking grapes is enjoyable exept in weather extremes. Most challenging is leaf and shoot thinning and shoot positioning (training the vines to the trellises to get optimal grape yields) in June and July because it takes so much hand labor.
His advice for aspiring grape growers? "Don't quit your day job! Growing grapes is more rewarding spiritually than it is monetarily."
Satek Winery has won several medals in the past years for its wines made from England's grapes, including a Bronze for Kreibaum Bay Dry Traminette, 2011; a Silver for Traminette, 2011; and Silver for Larry's Luscious Dry Red Wine, 2010 (a blend of Corot Noir and Noiret). |