101 Other Uses for a Vineyard

Not every year is a great vintage year. In one year, wines from the same vineyards might smell like roses and violets, and in the next like asparagus and peppers. An exceptionally wet year can result in grapes that taste as green as little Brussel sprouts; while a dry, hot summer can turn grapes into raisins before they're even truly ripe. Of course, this sort of thing Never Happens to major vineyards. With their small armies of trucks, quads, and vineyard scientists equipped with weather gauges, soil gauges and pocket refractometers, they are pretty well protected from elements and predators. It's the small viticulturist who is the hardest hit, the weekend gentleman farmer, and the retired-to-the-country vineyard owner.

The small vineyard grower often gets well into his dream project before he fully realizes the immense costs involved---not only the land, but the ripping, tilling, disking, surveying, irrigation, trellising and equipment necessary before the vines even go in the ground. Then he has to wait two to three years before seeing tiny clusters of investment return, which are perpetually endangered by dust, pests, hungry wildlife, rain, drought, and soil problems.

Therefore, the small, hobby viticulturist might want to consider these alternate uses for a vineyard, as a hedge against those terrible years when a "harvest" consists of moldy fruit, raisins, a few sour grapes left by the birds, or pithy grape clusters that you could scrub a sink with:

1. Live skeet range

Blackbirds, starlings, all our favorites. They swarm and swirl and make challenging yet rewarding target practice for beginners to advanced. Charge by the hour or the half-day, and reduce your predator problem.

2. Wildlife habitat

If guns and explosions are not your style, you can easily turn your vineyard into a certified wildlife habitat. All you need to do is write to the National Wildlife Association describing your vineyard, and list the various wildlife that benefit from this habitat, like insects, gophers, birds, deer, coyotes (they like to chew on rubber irrigation lines), and bobcats. The NWA will send you a lovely, authentic and numbered certificate suitable for framing in your home or tasting room.

3. Tourist attraction

Set up a roadside stall and sell vineyard souvenirs---pressed leaves, grapevine baskets, old oak staves for barbecues. Ocean Spray sells "Craisins;" we can sell "Graisins!" Or be really original---save what devastated fruit you can, retrieve the seeds, put them in little paper packets and sell them as "grapevine seeds."

4. Romantic getaway

A small cottage, an attractive hovel, a rental home, call it what you will, if it has vines and roses around it, you can call it La Merde Vineyards and rent it out by the night or the hour.

5. U-pick fruit

U-pick, and better yet, U-pay. There are always home winemakers panting for extra grapes, but why stop there? Call up the college frats, housewives, or sell the grapes as party fun---come pick and stomp!

6. Smuckers competition

Grape jelly, grapeseed oil, grape juice, raisins, pickled grapes, pickled grape leaves, grape vinegar, grapeseed massage oil (Cabernet scent or Chardonnay scent).

7. Experimental pest farm

Grow your own mutant nematodes, phylloxera, leafhoppers, mites, and fruit flies. Have fun experimenting with the various effects of household chemicals on your pest's genetic development.

8. Kudzu grafts

Your vines aren't growing well? Try grafting them over to kudzu, a highly adaptable, well-known and attractive ground cover seen all over the South. You'll never have a problem with erosion control.

9. Movie setting

Location scouts are always looking for scenic shots and places to film movies, commercials, aerobic videos, and infomercials. One month's rental could replace the value of an entire harvest. In fact, I often think that the entire concept of retiring from gainful employment to plant a vineyard would make excellent material for a Steve Martin movie.

10. Quad races

What could be more fun for dads and kids? Charge by the hour or the tankful, and let 'em race up and down the vineyard rows. Who knows, it could become the next popular motorized sport, even televised on ESPN.

So, the next time the frosts, gophers, birds and nematodes come to visit, just remember, you are the proud owner of a multi-purpose, organic, environmentally supportive, entertaining and sometimes profitable, little piece of the earth.