New York Grape Conference to Focus on Invasive Pests, Vine Management

Posted by Christina Herrick|February 4, 2019

This year’s B.E.V. NY conference – beverage, enology, and viticulture—will be held Feb. 27 through March 1 at the RIT Inn & Conference Center in Henrietta, NY.

B.E.V. NY is developed and hosted by the Finger Lakes Grape Program and Cornell’s Enology Extension Program. This is the sixth iteration of this joint venture between the two programs. This year, the New York Wine & Grape Foundation will be hosting their annual Unity Luncheon at the conference on Wednesday.

The business-focused program on Feb. 27 includes talks on topics label design, tax policy for wineries, consumer reaction to canned wines, and much more.

On Feb. 28, the focus turns to enology and current issues in winemaking, including a couple of sessions looking at the winemaking implications of the new trend of packaging wines in cans, and a training session that covers the annual Food Safety Modernization Act training requirements for wineries.

The viticulture program on March 1 is all about the grapes. Ben-Min Chang, a scientist from Washington State University, will talk about recent research on how berries manage water moving in and out of them, and what conditions can lead to berry splitting. Attendees also will hear about how climate change may be affecting farming in New York, including vineyards, how vineyard practices influence fruit and wine quality, and an update on several integrated pest management topics including the status of the newest invasive species for us to be aware of, the spotted lanternfly.