VineBots to Be

I have heretofore used this soapbox to speak of those things that are. Occasionally, I speak of how I wished things would be. Today, I venture into the realm of how I think things may become.

Robots have been a part of our lives for the greater part of a generation. Not the kind of robots from the Jetsons, but robots none the less. The dishwasher in your kitchen is a prime example. A machine designed for a single task which it performs autonomously.

I propose now a future vine tending robot. Like your dishwasher, this will be a machine with a single purpose, to produce the best possible wine grape. This will not be a mobile mechanized vineyard manager, it will be in charge of a single vine.

This will be the age of the VineBot (you heard the term here first according to Google). A machine that can respond to the needs of an individual vine and its grapes.

There was a time when an entire vineyard was treated the same way. Then we learned to tailor treatments to the needs of sections of vineyard. When GPS came along, it dramatically improved our ability to treat a single vineyard as many small sections.

The VineBot will be the apogee of this trend. Not only will the robotic nursery be able to treat vines individually, it will be able to ascertain the needs of individual grapes.

Why would we benefit from this level of scrutiny? Because a bunch of grapes that are of a consistent quality will create wines that are of a higher consistent quality.

This is according to Mark Greenspan, Ph.D. of Advanced Viticulture, LLC. While Dr. Greenspan has published evidence to support his claim, it resonates with my own common sense.

Better grapes, better wine.

The VineBot will be able to measure an individual grape's progress by using lasers to determine color and sugar levels. It will be able to manipulate the vine so that it can ripen more evenly than would ever be possible now.

It will be able to administer appropriate nutrients or pesticides to just one vine, so there will be no need to spray great quantities of chemicals around a field. This will greatly aid in sustainable viticulture.

Harvest will be completely automated. A small vehicle will travel the rows, receiving the bunches of grapes that are ready to be picked. The system can work at night, it can be incredibly selective, and it doesn't require skilled workers.

This is the key. It cost a lot of money to hire skilled pickers, and the number of pickers decreases every year. Ask any California farmer, and you will hear an ear full.

Eventually, it will become uneconomical to employ people to do the job that a machine should be doing, and thus the VineBot.

There is already mechanical harvesting, and as I mentioned GPS has really helped cut down on the over use of chemicals, but the VineBot still seems inevitable. The ability to consistently grow high quality fruit is a strong lure, and it is sure to drive research in this direction.

Perhaps vineyards of the future will be hydroponic, the several story long root systems replaced with tendrils in a nourishing gel, but I wouldn't bet on it.

That the vineyards will be more mechanized? That they will have even greater control over the vines? That there will be robots of some sort? I would call that a sure bet.