All over Osoyoos the last grapes of the season are ripe for the picking. Josie Tyabji, chair of the BC Wine Institute, said that with the long, warm autumn seen in the South Okanagan this year, this has been one of the best seasons seen in the past 25 years. Many local wineries agree that this has been a great season, however, many are saying it’s certainly not the best in the past quarter century. Photo by Mathew White.

Horrible spring weather had wine producers frantic a few months ago, but an extended run of incredibly nice weather this summer and fall has those same producers saying this might be the best wine season in a quarter century.
The leaves may be falling, but large clusters of grapes are still hanging on vines as the wine season in the South Okanagan officially comes to an end.
And while some may have been thinking the horrid spring would have had a negative effect on this year’s harvest, Josie Tyabji, chair of the BC Wine Institute, confirms they’re quite wrong as she said this is one of the best seasons seen in South Okanagan in more than 25 years.
“It (the wine season) started out in June and it was a little bit rainy so we had a slow start,” she said. “But as everybody can see, July, August and September have just been spectacular in terms of, not only the nice warm days, but also the warmer evenings. When we get the warmer evenings we get the acids dropping, which is nice.”
“It’s an excellent year. These longer falls really help with the flavour development by letting them hang on the vines for that little extra time.”
More than 60 per cent of vineyards in British Columbia are located in the South Okanagan, and for good reason.
Tyabji said the fabulous fall weather we’ve been experiencing has been nothing but good news for the wine industry.  Local wineries have been harvesting certain types of grapes (green grapes for white wine) since the beginning of September, but many are choosing to leave their red grapes on the vines as long as they can (often until the end of October, with ice-wine grapes left on even longer), she said.
“The longer you can stretch out the season, the better it is within the winery,” she said. “So we really like it when we have these longer falls. It really helps us within the winery.”
“With the reds, we’ve got this really elegant style because we’ve had the longer sunshine, and with the whites, we’ve got some really nice fruits coming out.”
Tyabji also mentioned the fact that vineyards can be a bit more forgiving when you have a longer stretch of nice weather. You don’t have to get out there and babysit as much as you would when we have more of the weather seen earlier in the year, she said.
Over at the Adega on 45th Estate Winery, co-owners and winemakers Fred Farinha and Alex Nunes said this has absolutely been a great year.
“For our first season, it’s been really good,” said Farinha. “We have nothing to compare it with, but it’s been pretty good.”
Farinha said they have already sold out of four of the seven different varieties offered at the local winery. Next year, they expect to add seven more red wines, and if this year is any indicator, they should be delicious, he added.
Out of the total 38 acres used by Adega, Farinha said they have harvested about 40 per cent of their grapes, but he expects to be 100 per cent harvested by the end of the month.
“There are lots of sugars and we’re just waiting for the acids to come down and let Mother Nature do her thing,” he said.
Nunes agreed that with the extended warm fall this year, it has been a great season for grapes.
“That really helped this year,” he said. “Our acids are really down, sugars are great, and so it’s just a matter of getting in there and picking everything.”
Just a few minutes up the road and Randy Picton, winemaker with Nk’Mip Cellars, said that while this will turn out to be a great year, he thinks it is too early to tell if it’s going to be one of the best on record.
“We’ve been more than happy with what we’ve brought in so far,” he said. “The quality seems to be very, very good – benefitted by the extended good weather in September and October obviously, so things are looking pretty good.”
“But I wouldn’t say absolutely perfect. There are still some varietals out hanging that the quality remains to be seen, so it might be jumping the gun to say it’s the best season in 25 years.”
Over at the third and final winery located in that area, Christopher Tolley, co-owner and winemaker at Moon Curser Vineyards, said he thinks while this has been a good year, it certainly isn’t the best they’ve seen.
“Out of the last three, it’s certainly the best,” he said. “I’ve heard that a few times, that this has been the best season in recent memory, but not from the growers I talk to … and I got the same feeling that they do.”
Tolley said with the past two years being so poor, it’s easy to think this year has been spectacular, whereas it’s really just been average. Even though there was a lot of nice weather seen in late summer, the rainy spring might have been just a bit too much to fully recover, he said.