Earth Day Special: Imagining My Green Winery Dream Team and Honoring Organic Leaders

I am steeling myself up for the greenwashing orgy that Earth Day typically brings. All the people who have ethically dubious green claims will be shouting some truthiness green bona fide from the rooftop and the indiscriminate spreaders of misinformation will already be hard at it, disseminating it into every social or media rivulet they can find.

BUT I am going to go in a positive direction. 

If basketball leagues and baseball fans can have dream teams, why not organic wine lovers? I'd like to focus good thoughts on my dream winery...

What would it look like? There are so many inspiring models to think about.

It would have worm compost bins (like at Apricot Lane Farm, where Alan York established the bins as the first step) ...it would exist with wildlife corridors and biodiversity corridors (like at Emiliana)...it would bottle label its wines with its organic or biodynamic certification (like Lindquist Family and Grgich Hills Estate do)...it would use herbal sprays in the vineyards (like all certified biodynamic vineyards do)...it would also have a veggie garden that sells food (like Johan Vineyards or Preston Farm & Winery or others)...and it would have all electric vehicles (I'm still waiting for someone to fill that niche)...and it would be more or less dry farmed (having planted for that with head trained vines, properly spaced apart, or knowing how to do it, like Dominus Estate)...it would preserve old vines (like Ridge and Turley)...

It would source all of its energy from renewables (like Bonterra)...and it would pay growers to go organic (like Frog's Leap, ZD Wines and others). If it doesn't have any land and just buys grapes, it would buy only certified organic grapes (like Horse and Plow)...and preferably it would integrate animals into the land (like Clay Shannon with 900 sheep!, and others)...and it would look to integrate polyculture into the property (like Troon). 

It would be homey and family run (like Tres Sabores) with chickens and a few sheep...or its own agro-ecological system (like Mimi Casteel's HopeWell) ...and it be widely available and affordable with good distribution (like Domaine Bousquet and Cooper Mountain)...or it would be luxurious (for special occasions like Adamvs)...it would make the greatest wine (Steve Beckmen and Bob Lindquist get special recognition, along with Aaron Pott and the Ridge Vineyards team but this category is HUGE and it really isn't fair to single any people out, because there are so many)...and it would evangelize and spread the news about good farming and beautiful winemaking as widely as possible (like Tablas Creek). And it might be housed in a beautiful old barn (like at Brick House Vineyards or Lumos) or a nouveau palace/temple of wine (like Opus One) or volcanic plateau in the Vaca mountains (like Oakville Ranch). 

Here's to the people who make these dreams a reality every day. 

Thank you to Alan York, Andrew Beede, Lou Preston, Philipe Coderey, Julie Johnson, the Turley family, Dai Crisp, Chris Williams, Jason Haas, Jordan Lonborg, Tegan Passalaqua, Mark and Liz Bokisch, the team at Emiliana, George and Alex Davis at Porter Creek, the spirit of Amigo Bob, the Ted and Laddie Hall family, Steve and Jill Matthiasson, Mark Neal, Phil Coturri, Sam Coturri, Craig Camp, Bill and Barb Steele, Jeff Dawson, Barbara Gross, Clay Shannon, John and Rory Williams, Anne Bousquet and Labid, Aaron Pott, Lindsay Hoopes, the Wornick family, Eric Jensen, Dan Fishman and team at Donum, Morgan Beck at Johan, Joe Nielsen and the team at Ram's Gate, Natalie Winkler, the Hoxsey/Pelissa family, Ivo Grgich, Paul Dolan, the Galleano family, and a hundred others whose names I will add to this list over time. 

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

And to all of you who are still not sure organic farming or certification are for you, hang out with some of these wonderful folks and find out how it works and why it's so worth it.