PHYLLOXERA COPS STAY OUT OF PAPERS

WARNING WITH A WELCOME: PHYLLOXERA CONTROLS IN THE YARRA VALLEY

London's Decanter First Journal To Report Ocker Vine Pox
Still Nothing In South Australian Press
by PHILIP WHITE

For a moment there, DRINKSTER thought it was the only journal in the world to report the phylloxera scandal in Victoria's Yarra Valley.

But yesterday, 19^th January, Guy Seddon got a bit out from beneath the fusty old skirts of the London tome, Decanter. (Whatever happened to good old days of the Dekka? – see THUS SPRACH THE LORD)

Seddon quoted Victoria's Department of Primary Industries thus: “... a detection of the grapevine pest phylloxera has been made in an existing control area in the Yarra Valley, north east of Melbourne ...

“The Phylloxera and Grape Industry Board of South Australia is the only body of its type in the world established specifically to deal with phylloxera. It publishes information on recognising phylloxera and warns that detections tend to be made up to several years after the initial occurrence of the infestation.

“Grape growers in other regions, especially those who have had regular contact with the Yarra Valley or with high volumes of wine tourism, have been advised to be particularly vigilant in looking for signs of phylloxera.”

Thankyou, Mother London!

Then, a faithful DRANKSTER sent us a link to Decanter from December 11^th, beneath the head “Phylloxera threatens 70% of Australia's Yarra Valley”.

This story placed the outbreak smack in the middle of a Foster's-owned 32ha vineyard in the Coldstream area.

“ ‘We've got a removal and destruction plan ready to go’, said Foster's spokesman Troy Hey. ‘It's just waiting on the Department of Primary Industries to go ahead’.”

Decanter said it would take several months to find out whether the pest has spread and vineyards within the control area will not be able to move plant material or machinery out of the area, and pointed out the district had already lost an estimated 40% of its grape production to severe October frosts.

“Michael Matthews, Chairman of the Victorian Wine Industry Association, said the Department of Primary Industry needs to do more to stop the phylloxera from spreading”, the story continued.

“There's a protocol where the DPI is supposed to go through all the wine regions and declare them free of phylloxera”, Matthews told Decanter. “Only half of this has been done”.

Then, another addicted DRANKSTER send us a copy of Jeni Port, in The Age, Melbourne, reporting “The insect was found last Friday and officially identified yesterday by officials from the Department of Primary Industry in a small section of eight-year-old merlot vines in the 32-hectare Beavis Vineyard, at Coldstream".

The vines had been suffering from poor vigour.

“The vineyard is owned by Australia's largest wine producer, Foster's, and is across the road from another Foster's-owned vineyard, St Hubert's. The good news for Foster's is that its quick detection may mean the aphid has not spread to further vineyards.

“Troy Hey, from Foster's, said Merlot grape varieties had been the worst affected and that the winery had been quarantined. Vines from the affected area would be destroyed, Mr Hey said. He also said that the find would not affect wine prices for at least the next two years.

“The bad news is that phylloxera can exist undetected underground for years before it strikes.

“Just how phylloxera arrived on the Valley's doorstep is unknown, although the likely culprit is well-known - man. The aphid moves from infected regions (Victoria has four) into new areas by hitching a ride in mud on car tyres, shoes, boots, and in harvesting and vineyard equipment. It can also move around on the roots of rootlings (baby vines), which was the alleged cause of the last recorded phylloxera outbreak at Whitlands in 1991.

By 1995, the entire King Valley was a phylloxera zone, joining long-time phylloxera areas such as Nagambie, Mooroopna and the North-East.

“The Department of Primary Industry has quarantined Beavis Vineyard and will test neighbouring vineyards within a five-kilometre radius in the coming week. It stresses that phylloxera is not a public health issue although it is certainly a financial issue for wine producers.

Port quoted Guill de Pury, owner of the Yeringberg vineyard (est 1863), which has some of the Yarra’s oldest vines. His vineyard is not planted to the rootstock, making it potentially easy prey to the aphid.

“It's been a phylloxera-free area forever”, de Pury told her. “This comes as a bit of a shock.”

In conclusion, Michael Matthews, president of the Yarra Valley Wine Growers Association, told Port that he's remaining optimistic, but added that the phylloxera find is a wake-up call.

“There is a need to instil in everyone in the industry the need to protect themselves against this sort of outbreak”, he said.

“All good”, DRINKSTER told herself lovingly. “Pity no South Australian paper has had the balls to spread the warning, with all those tens of thousands of Victorians coming over here for the Adelaide bicycle races with Lance Armstrong and everything.”

But then we looked at the date.

That Jeni Port article was from December 6^th, 2006.
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The wowsers are not ready

by PHILIP WHITE - This was published in The Independent Weekly in 2006

Saturday’s reading started with Friday’s Financial Review colour mag. The first reference to the drug, alcohol, came quickly with the head “Drinks missionary bar none”, a piece about London’s new bar czar, Jonathon Downey. He’s coming to Sydney to open more bars. “What the hell are we going to do when we can’t smoke, dance, drink and fight in bars anymore?” he asked.

Then came a woman in suspenders with a bottle of Dom Perignon pink, giving Karl Lagerfeld a plug. The old restaurateur, Beppi Polese, was next: full page, in his cellar, white wine in hand. Over the page he’s sniffing a red. Another full page praised vintage port.

The Life and Leisure section devoted half a page to Seppeltsfield, our most hallowed port house. Then a double page to “the historic riesling region”, Clare.

There were pieces about pubs losing money via the smoke bans, and the MD of Adelaide Bank being awarded an expensive burgundy for achieving a twenty five per cent increase in profit.

Move to the Weekend Oz. “Clare may offend again” turned out to be about a serial pedophile, with no mention of historic riesling. Similarly, the bit about Bob Francis made no mention of alcohol, but Lion Nathan confirmed a $25 million profit in Business. The Tour de France winner made the front page of Sport saying his testosterone was high because he’d had a pint of beer.

Travel included a half page on the Italian winemakers of the King Valley, another praising the Pinots noir of Curly Flat, and an encouraging piece about the glories you can drink with your food at Brasserie Moustache, which everyone should attend. It’s near Henschke’s. Magazine ran another piece about Seppeltsfield.

Then there was yours truly recommending the wines of Tim Smith in The Independent Weekly, and I imagine The Advertiser must have had alcohol in it somewhere.

Considering all this, it’s amusing to find the Fin Review’s Health page listing Australia’s “top six drugs” as being aspirin, insulin, diuretics, antibiotics, Paracetamol, and the opiates.

Who are they kidding? Most of the dudes I know on that stuff take it to alleviate the effects of alcohol.

I dined recently with Dr. David Caldicott, the emergency and trauma research fellow at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, and Sandra Kanck, the Democrat. While we drank an exquisite red from Ben Jeanneret – Clare offending again – we talked about the hypocrisy of this society when it comes to drug use and abuse.

Now that the fizz of sanctimonious outrage is settling, it’s worth re-examining the pasting all media gave Kanck for her attempt at injecting some logic into the drug debate. Having read her contentious Legislative Council speech of May 10, complete with the contrary hissings of Anne Bressington – thanks for that, Nick – one can only marvel that none of these detractors can see that there are votes in more sensible, realistic, holistic drug policy. Or maybe they can. Maybe that’s why they’re all so hissy.

Maybe Bressington suspects that the party-drug users who voted for Xenophon may have cast their ballot in another direction if they’d known about her.

The infuriating spaghetti of theories and ideas that rise from any contemplation of drug use share one point of eureka clarity, and this is where they most revealingly intersect: the point where drug policy is actually formed. Who forms it? Drug companies? The liquor barons? The religious right? The Laura Norder brigade? Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. And the politicians and press who can control the ebb and flow of public fear and derision by ridiculing the likes of the well-intentioned Kanck. They’re scared and angry. They think the debate is evil in itself.

The wowsers certainly aren’t ready for Caldicott. As a scientist and an intellectual, he’s razor sharp and determined. As a hot-blooded Irish catholic who dated Dr Ian Paisley’s daughter, he understands the holy roller, the Bible-poker, the interferist and the self-interested powermonger as well as he knows the reality of life and death at the front line in his wards. Where does his budget go? Repairing the victims of alcohol, of course.

“Until I came to Australia I’d never met a dim Australian”, he said. “You have a genetic ingenuity which you betray by adopting an American drug policy which is used as a political agenda. It’s morally bankrupt. It should be the doctors and scientists making this agenda, not politicians, unelected priests, or press.”

I’ll drink to that.