An above-average grape harvest is expected in Mecsekalja

(Photo: Pixabay)

The institute, which operates as the second largest grape gene bank in Europe and the sixth largest in the world, said in a statement sent to MTI on Friday: the first harvest in South Transdanubia started on the southern slopes of Mecsek, in the western part of Pécs, on the university plantation. Highlighted: The institute is the only one in Hungary to carry out world-class resistance breeding, the aim of which is to create and strengthen an environmentally conscious, more sustainable grape and wine sector. Such resistant varieties – the Cosmopolitan and the Jásmin – ripened their crops first, and on the plantations, instead of the 7-8 treatments applied to the traditional varieties, chemical plant protection had to be applied only twice – they drew attention. Quoting Zoltán Madaras, the president of the research institute, they wrote: although nature started later this year due to the cool spring and rainy weather, it did not affect the yield and quality.

On the 39-hectare university plantation, the cooler-than-average spring resulted in protracted budding

The high rainfall at the end of winter and spring favored fungal infections, but at the same time, tight and properly timed plant protection was successful. The abundant precipitation and the rapid increase in average temperature resulted in an almost explosive shoot growth and cluster formation, they added. They elaborated on it: although in the summer, severe thunderstorms, windstorms and hailstorms destroyed the plantations in many places, all of this avoided the research institute’s growing areas, so the bunches in Mecsekalja are full, the berries are larger than average, and the yield will be above average. At the same time, it was indicated that the harvest of early ripening varieties starts later compared to the previous drought years, an average difference of 10-14 days can be predicted.

MTI