QUESTIONS

The questions, then are these: will commercial strains take over a fermentation in a winery where no commercial yeast has ever been used before? Even if you have never used a commercial strain of yeast, will your “wild” fermentation be overtaken by a dominant commercial strain if you are producing wine in a region where commercial strains have been used by other wineries and that become part of the regional environment (terrior)? Wright is organizing a similar study in Oregon that will include Penner-Ash Wine Cellars, Beaux Freres, Grand Cru Estates, Cristom and Bethel Heights Winery. Also, Road 13 Vineyards, one of the original 3 wineries involved in the study, is in the process of building a new facility that will never have had a commercial yeast used in its proximity. They will test for which yeast strains are present in their first fermentations, further clarifying these startling results.

IMPLICATIONS

It’s notable that among the primary criteria to be called a “Natural” wine, is that the yeast used must be “wild” or “indigenous to the vineyard/winery. If these findings appear to be consistent across the globe’s growing regions, “Natural” winemaker may have to rethink what they consider necessary in order to call a wine “Natural”. Futhermore, numerous wines are marketed as being produced with “Wild Yeast”. Again, if these findings are consistent across growing regions, there may be a need to stop such marketing or make it easy and simply re-define what “wild” means.

For he record, the leader of the study reported upon in Wine Business Monthly, Dan Durrall, believes “there is no such thing as a ‘wild yeast’ fermentation.”