Act of God

The Americans are a devout people, by and large, with a fondness for a literal reading of scripture, so it shouldn't surprise us that when faced with a major natural difficulty, they resort to the language of biblical dread and despair.

"Plague". "Act of God". "Disaster". All these poignant terms, pregnant with terror, are the sort of thing you hear when Californian winemakers talk about Pierce's Disease. And they use them with good reason. Pierce's Disease is not a new thing for winemakers ­ like most diseases it has a long history but has largely confined itself to the perimeters of winemaking problems ­ but over the last few years Pierce's Disease has become the major threat to the very future of winemaking in California.

The threat has increased simply because the disease has come to be carried by the Glassy-Winged Sharpshooter, a particularly unpleasant little bug with the power to suck sap through the bark of the vine. The female of the species, needless to say, lays more eggs in her lifetime than you can shake an angry winemaker's fist at.

The Glassy-Winged came to California a decade ago, and has been causing trouble ever since, transmitting the bacterium xylella fastidiosa, which will bloom into Pierce's Disease, and kill the vine in a few years. The Californians, amidst their biblical-sounding dread, are scrambling for a solution to the problem, having amassed a massive war-chest to fund many strands of scientific research. To date, however, no magic antidote to the Glassy-Winged Sharp-Shooter has arisen, so the bug is busy setting about destroying whatever areas of California's wine valleys it fancies.

So, if there is a bottle or two of Paul Draper's Ridge Zinfandel, or some nice Mondavi Pinot Noir, gathering a patina of dust in your cupboard, it may be an idea to leave it there for a while longer. In a decade, it could prove to be your pension.

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