YANKEE VINE-KILLER BUG

In 1863, species of native American grapes were taken to Botanical Gardens in England. These cuttings carried a species of root louse called phylloxera vastatrix which attacks and feeds on the vine roots and leaves. Phylloxera is indigenous to the Mississippi River Valley and was unknown outside North America at the time. Powdery mildew, a fungal disease, also indigenous to North America, had previously migrated to Europe and caused problems in some areas. No one, however, had any idea of the wide-reaching destructive potential of Phylloxera. Native American varieties developed resistance to phylloxera by evolving a thick and tough root bark, so that they were relatively immune to damage. The vinifera vines had no such evolutionary protection and phylloxera ate away at their roots, causing them to rot and the plant to die and driving the pests to seek other nearby live hosts, spreading inexorably through entire vineyards and on to others. By 1865, phylloxera had spread to vines in Provence. Over the next 20 years, it inhabited and decimated nearly all the vineyards of Europe. Many methods were attempted to eradicate phylloxera: flooding, where possible, and injecting the soil with carbon bisulfide, had some success in checking the louse, but were costly and the pests came back as soon as the treatments stopped. Finally Thomas Munson, a horticulturist from Dennison, Texas, realized that native American vines were resistant and suggested grafting the vinifera vines onto riparia hybrid rootsocks. So, there began a long, laborious process of grafting every wine vine in Europe over to American rootstocks. It was only in this manner that the European wine industry could be retrieved from extinction. Downy mildew, another fungal disease in American grapevines, unfortunately probably migrated to Europe on some of the rootstocks imported for grafting. One tragic consequence of the Phylloxera devastation is that many of the native species indigenous to Europe, since they were of negligible commercial value, were not perpetuated by grafting and became extinct. There was some debate generated by this replanting that the quality declined in "post-phylloxera" wines. Whether this was indeed the case and whether this was due to the rootstocks themselves or to the relatively sudden and nearly universal youth of the vines, or to changes in vinification techniques, or to some other concurrent factor or variable, is unknown. Undoubtedly, it will remain a matter of theory and opinion and provide animated conversation at wine tastings, but ultimately never be proven. The blight resulted in shortages of wine for many years, so that fraud and adulteration became problems, eventually leading French wine growers to the form the system of Appellation Controlée, which has become the model for all wine producing countries to both protect wine trade reputations and authenticate products for consumers. Northern California wine harvest, c. 1900. Around the turn of the century, the quality of American wines had reached excellence by international standards, as testified to by the three dozen medals won by them at the 1900 Paris Exposition. During the period when the Europeans were contending with phylloxera, the American wine industry was ironically flourishing. By 1900, America had a fully developed and proud commercial wine producing business. Leading brands from California, New York, Ohio, Missouri and New Jersey were appearing on many of the best restaurant wine lists alongside French, German and Italian listings. Barrels of California wine were being regularly exported to Australia, Canada, Central America, England, Germany, Mexico and the Orient.