Dent de Lion is a new handcraft brand established for the best of all reasons—to save a special old Lodi vineyard

Zinfandel harvest in Dent de Lion Vineyard. Dent de Lion.

There is a brand new, handcraft local wine label here in Lodi, started up for all the right (at least in our book) reasons: To save a special old vineyard.

Make no mistake, old vineyards in Lodi need saving. Many of them are in grave danger of disappearing, mostly because sales of value priced wines are currently down, and big wineries are not renewing contracts with many of the families holding on to old, head trained vineyards planted to heritage grapes such as Zinfandel or Carignan...

  Continue »

The recent 2025 Wine Market Council conference tackles the domestic wine industry's current setbacks head-on

Dr. Liz Thach, MW, President of the Wine Market Council.

This past April 2 at the 2025 Wine Market Council (WMC) Annual Research Conference and Members Meeting, held in the City of Napa, there was some illuminating discussions on the overall state of the American wine industry.

Some of the burning questions that were addressed included:

• What are the core reasons explaining the current lack of enthusiasm for wine on the part of consumers, reflected in the alarming downward trend in consumption over the past two years?
• How can the wine industry rebuild relevance with modern consumers?
• To what extent will impending tariffs further hamper the health of the domestic wine industry?
• What or where are the potential growth opportunities over the next few years?

  Continue »

Visual discussion of grapevine training during April bud break

The first week of April is a special time of year, when you can observe early bud break as well as the beautiful "bones" of old vine plantings, such as in this 116-year-old Zinfandel on the east side of Lodi's Mokelumne River appellation.

Bud break and beautiful bones

It’s that time of year when grapevines are bursting all over with new buds. When 2025's spring equinox arrived up this past March 20, most of Lodi wine country’s vineyards were still bereft of these tiny buds. But during the last week of the month, when temperatures finally started to warm up, the bare buds began to swell, and out popped the leaves, unfurling like sails on a ship, along with the tiny precursors of grape clusters, which eventually become the flowers from which individual berries form.

Early spring and April is an interesting season because the bare “bones,” the trunks and limbs, of all the plants are still quite visible. It will be another two months or so before the canes become long enough to drape over and hide the spur positions with grapevine “canopy,” the anatomy consisting of leaves and shoots essential for the process of photosynthesis, necessary to bring plants to fruition...

  Continue »