HMC News – January 2026
Currently rainfall is tracking a 200% of “normal” for this time period with a total rainfall of 8 inches to date, although our snowpack levels are less than average. While it was a cold December, the chill hours still remain below 500, which is the lowest on record at this point in time over the last five years. There is still time to accumulate additional chill hours, we continue to count hours until the trees bloom.
We are in the heart of pruning in our vineyards. The pre-pruner is still working its way through our vines. We have a new equipment addition, a whole vine mulcher (pictured below) which attaches to a skid steer. This machine is helping us redevelop our vineyards in a more timely manner. Whole vines are first removed from the ground with another implement, and then this machine’s rotating flails will grab and grind the vines into smaller pieces. The organic matter then returns back to the soil. Once finished, we can replant the acres with a new variety of vines, all while leaving the trellis and irrigation structure intact.
This winter, we have been planting our tree fruit orchards with a mechanical planter. Before we begin planting, the field is “marked” by a tractor using GPS. The markings create a grid on the surface of the field that show where each tree should be planted. Once the orchard is marked, the planting machine (which is towed behind a tractor), digs into the earth and opens up a furrow in the ground. Then a tree is planted in the furrow in the exact spot we had previously marked for it. Once planted, the machine pushes dirt from behind the tree to fill in the furrow, resulting in a perfectly planted orchard. This system gives us the ability to be extremely precise with our desired planting spacings, as well as planting depth.
In our tree fruit orchards, we have begun grafting certain varieties. Grafting is a process in which scion wood, a piece of wood from the desired varietal, is bonded to existing rootstock. We graft for one of
two reasons. The first is when a variety does not perform the way we had hoped, but the tree is still young, we will graft a new variety to the rootstock to replace the underperforming variety. This allows
the new variety to reach harvest more quickly than planting entirely new trees. The second reason is so that we can plant a root stock, allow the tree to grow for a year, and then choose a variety the following season. Different root stocks are beneficial for different reasons, such as drought resistance, increased vigor, or successful growth in a particular soil type.
