Lodi Wine History: The Making of California's Most Dynamic Wine Region

Kerne Erickson's artistic vision of the bucolic Lodi AVA and the region's signature, deep-rooted valley oak, native to the appellation's deep, rich sandy loam soils

As we celebrate California Wine Month this September, there's no better time to dive into the rich history of grape growing and wine production in one of the state's most significant appellations.

The Lodi American Viticultural Area stands as a testament to the evolution of California winemaking, transforming from a single designation in 1986 to a complex system of seven nested sub-appellations by 2006. This comprehensive exploration, originally authored by renowned wine journalist Randy Caparoso, traces the fascinating journey of how Lodi earned federal recognition as an AVA and subsequently subdivided into distinct terroir-driven regions.

From the initial 85,000-acre appellation to the sophisticated understanding of microclimates that led to the Mokelumne River, Clements Hills, and five other sub-AVAs, this is the story of American viticulture's commitment to expressing the unique characteristics of place through wine.

A history of Lodi winegrowing — establishment of the Lodi AVA and its seven sub-appellations

1986 Establishment of Lodi AVA

The system of officially approved American Viticultural Areas was first established in 1978 by the ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives) regulatory arm, allowing for the definition of viticultural areas within the U.S. for the purpose of controlled usage on wine labels and advertising. 

Logo for the ATF division that establishes AVAs (American Viticultural Areas) upon review of petition

Thereafter, any interested person or party could petition the ATF — today, split off as the TTB (the U.S. Department of the Treasury's Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau) — to establish an AVA, providing that there is sufficient evidence to do so. Petitions must include:

• Evidence that the name of the proposed viticultural area is locally and/or nationally known as referring to the area specified in the petition.
• Historical or current evidence that the boundaries of the viticultural area are as specified in the petition.
• Evidence relating to the geographical characteristics (climate, soil elevation, topography, etc.) which distinguish the viticultural features of the proposed area from surrounding areas.

2001 depiction of the Lodi AVA from Wine Enthusiast's winemag.com, prior to the appellation's expansion of borders in 2002 and division into 7 sub-AVAs in 2006

• A description of the specific boundaries of the viticultural area, based upon features that can be found on United States Geological Survey (i.e. USGS) maps of the largest applicable scale.
• A copy of the appropriate USGS maps with the boundaries prominently mapped.
• Legally, federal law requires that 85% of any wine labeled with the name of an American Viticultural Area must come from that viticultural region.

In June of 1980, Missouri's Augusta AVA became the country’s first official viticultural area. After considerable wrangling among growers and wineries, a Napa Valley AVA was approved in early 1981. In 1982 a petition was submitted for a Lodi AVA, which was approved in 1986.

Arkansas Democrat-Gazette's free-hand mapping of the Lodi AVA (by Kelly Brant) in approximation to the Golden Gate Bridge, Yosemite, the Redwood parks, Lake Tahoe, Death Valley, and of course, Hollywood

At the time when the original 1982 petition was submitted, it was noted that the viticultural area historically known as Lodi contained approximately 39,000 acres of vineyards and 15 bonded wineries. Today, as of 2020, the Lodi AVA consists of over 100,000 acres of planted wine grapes (easily the most in the U.S.), and over 85 bonded wineries… and growing.

In the Federal Register document acknowledging the 1986 approval, the Lodi AVA is described as "an inland area that is comprised mainly of alluvial fan, flood plain lands, and lower and higher terrace lands." Its boundaries were summarized as "located in California in the counties of Sacramento and San Joaquin," with a "beginning point... located at the intersection of the Calaveras River and the San Joaquin-Stanislaus County line."

Graphic demonstrating the climatic impact of cool air sucked through the coastal mountain gap from San Francisco Bay to the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta — the single most significant factor defining the Lodi AVA

The Federal Register goes on to define the Lodi AVA in terms of the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) 1937 Soil Survey of the Lodi Area: "Owing to its location opposite the wind gap leading inland from the Golden Gate, the range in temperature is narrower than in more northerly and southerly parts of the great valley (i.e. Central Valley)."

The Lodi AVA following the 2002 expansion of its borders at the west and south corners of the appellation (i.e. the gray areas on this map)

2002 Expansion of Lodi AVA

Five years after the original establishment of the Lodi AVA, in 1991 some 600 Lodi AVA growers came together to form the self-mandated Lodi-Woodbridge Wine Commission (now called the Lodi Winegrape Commission) for the purpose of regional promotion, education, and viticultural research. This would be a momentous development, playing a crucial role in Lodi’s current status as a wine-growing region of note.

In an effort to reconcile the then-existing boundaries of the Lodi AVA with the jurisdiction of the Lodi-Woodbridge Wine Commission as well as how the USDA's California Crush District 11 defined "Lodi," in 2000 a petition was submitted to the ATF to expand the Lodi AVA on its west and south sides by 93,500 acres, which at that time included an additional 9,240 acres of planted wine grapes.

California Crush Districts (the Lodi AVA brought in alignment with District 11 in 2002 expansion of appellation)

The second, expanded version of the Lodi AVA was approved in 2002. In the approved petition, the climate of the additional areas was described as having "the same moderating influences of the Sacramento Delta (i.e. Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta) winds that define the current boundaries." Plus, the "soils of the proposed expansion area are substantially similar to those of the existing viticultural area" — derived "mainly from mixed mineral alluvium, products of weathering, erosion, and deposition along the western slope of the Sierra Nevada...

"Every significant climate feature, such as rainfall, degree-days, frost occurrence, and mean temperatures, are virtually the same within the proposed additions as those that occur inside the existing Lodi viticultural area."

Vintage postcard depicting Flame Tokay, a table grape that, historically, could consistently attain its vivid pink color only within the Lodi AVA because of the appellation's combination of Mediterranean climate and deep (as much as 90-ft.), rich yet porous sandy loam soil

2006 Division into Seven-Nested AVAs

In August 2006, the TTB (Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau) approved the usage of seven new American Viticultural Areas (a.k.a. AVAs) falling within the broader Lodi AVA. At that time, the question in the minds of a lot of people in the wine industry, the media, and consumers was: why?

Isn’t getting anyone to recognize Lodi as an existing wine region hard enough, without complicating the matter with seven more sub-regions, or "nested" AVAs?

The question is legitimate. Then again, so is the answer — the reasons for establishing the Lodi sub-appellations even if, in the beginning, they are unfamiliar to just about everyone outside the growers who actually work these vineyards.

The flat, lower elevation topography (about 50 ft.) typifies the Mokelumne River AVA in the historic Bechthold Vineyard (Lodi's oldest vines, planted in 1886)

The first reason is historical: The best and most recognizable wine regions in the world are all defined by multiple appellations based upon differences, from subtle to drastic, in climate, soil, topography, etc. 

Take, for instance, France’s famous Burgundy region, which is divided into 44 villages controlled by their “appellations of origin” (the French system of geographical certification known as Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée, or AOC); each defined by physical differences in growing conditions that make them slightly different from the other. Within these villages are over 500 recognized vineyards (or climates) which, like Burgundy’s villages, are delineated by precisely defined boundaries that have gone unchanged for centuries. You cannot take grapes from, say, the commune of Meursault and put them into wines bottled as Puligny-Montrachet, even though the two villages are right next to each other, or even if you own properties in both (which many producers do). 

The grand crus vineyards of France's Puligny-Montrachet, defined by centuries-old boundaries

Taking it further: Within the Burgundian commune of Puligny-Montrachet there are a total of 21 vineyards; some of these vineyards have as many as 40 owners, each managing their own tiny parcel. Wines made from the vineyard called Chevalier-Montrachet (totaling 17.5 acres) may not be lawfully bottled by the name of the adjoining vineyard, Bâtard-Montrachet (27.4 acres), and vice-versa. You could blend the two together, but you would have to call it “Puligny-Montrachet,” a village name that usually fetches a lower price than the single-vineyard wines. In Burgundy — as in the rest of France controlled by AOC regulations — location is everything, and names are sacrosanct. Why? Because characteristics of the country’s finest wines are tied directly to the growing conditions of where they are grown — a concept better known as terroir, or “sense of place.”

Napa Valley's 16 sub-AVAs

Therefore, if Lodi was ever to begin to be considered a region worthy of any degree of respect or prestige, the establishment of sub-regions based upon terroir-related distinctions had to come sooner than later. The Napa Valley Viticultural Area, for instance, consists of 16 different sub-AVAs. You can ask the same question — why? Isn’t saying “Napa Valley” good enough? But if you ask a Cabernet Sauvignon producer in Napa Valley’s Coombsville AVA, he/she would tell you that Coombsville Cabernet Sauvignons are significantly different from Cabernet Sauvignons from, say, the Rutherford, Howell Mountain, Calistoga or Los Carneros AVAs; and in fact, the soil types, aspects of slopes, elevations and climate zones differ drastically among those sub-AVAs. Of course, these Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignons come out different; and it’s silly to expect them to taste, or be rated (attention wine critics!), the same way. Consumers have the right to know these distinctions.

Delta slough alongside the Ripken family's Guard Rd. vineyard located at the far west side of the Lodi AVA as much as 30 ft. below sea level (in contrast to Lodi's Clements Hills and Borden Ranch AVAs on the far east side which has plantings on 150 to 300-ft. slopes)

The second reason for sub-dividing a region like Lodi — with, by far, the largest number of wine grape acreage in the U.S. (more than Napa Valley and Sonoma County combined) — was, of course, because of the reality of terroir-related differences that affect the morphology of plants and grapes, growing and winemaking decisions, and ultimately characteristics of wines. Right now many consumers, and much of the media and trade, may not quite grasp those differences. But that doesn’t mean they don’t exist. And what is authenticity, if not acknowledgment of the truth behind vineyards, vines, grapes, and wines?

Lodi's seven sub-AVAs, officially recognized in 2006

Lodi's Seven Sub-AVAs

So here’s how the establishment of Lodi’s seven AVAs went down: In August 2005 a group called the Lodi American Viticultural Areas (nicknamed LAVA) Steering Committee submitted a petition to the TTB to recognize the following sub-appellations based upon distinctions primarily having to do with differing soils and topographies, more subtle climate-related differences, plus additional evidence demonstrating precedent in terms of historic usage of the proposed place names within each respective region. The seven additional Lodi AVAs approved in August 2006:

Alta Mesa
Borden Ranch
Clements Hills
Cosumnes River
Jahant
Mokelumne River
Sloughhouse

A copy of the original 2005 petition can be found online in the National Archives of the Federal Register. 

In these two photos: Graphic difference in soils of the Mokelumne River AVA (above, defined by extremely deep, fine Tokay sandy loam) and the Clements Hills AVA (below, defined by shallower, gravelly, hillside Redding clay) — factors exacting direct impact on the phenolic content and aromas of resulting wines

 

The process of carving out new Lodi AVAs began in the summer of 2001, and from the beginning, it involved both growers and producers. The conversation was sparked when Lodi grower Keith Watts (Keith Watts Vineyards) and Bokisch Vineyards’ Markus Bokisch began thinking of ways to highlight the differences between the volcanic soils in what was to become the Clements Hills AVA with surrounding areas in the Lodi. Bokisch and Watts organized a committee and began consulting with numerous longtime Lodi growers. They also hired Deborah Elliot-Fiske, a Professor Emeritus at U.C. Davis, to help sort out climatic and soil characteristics in an unimpeachable scientific fashion.

Keith Watts (on right), one of the co-chairs of the LAVA steering committee that proposed Lodi's seven sub-AVAs in 2005, toasting winemaker Mike McCay in Watts' TruLux Vineyard (Mokelumne River-Lodi AVA)

In a story entitled Why Form an AVA? published in the October 2006 issue of Wines & Vines, a wine industry magazine, Bokisch was quoted to say that the original draft of the application for the seven AVAs was about 230 pages long and included detailed data on the climate, soils, and histories of the proposed regions. According to the magazine, “Bokisch estimated that the group spent between 1,200 and 1,800 hours preparing the application,” and “about $30,000 was collected to fund the research and applications.” 

Added Bokisch: "The greatest benefit of the use of the new AVA names will be to the consumer. It will help educate the consumer on the diversity of this region, not its homogeneity.” When asked if the new sub-AVAs might take something away from a focus on the broader Lodi AVA, Bokisch was quoted to say he didn’t think so. “A person who buys a ripe, delicious Mokelumne River Zinfandel will have no doubt as to the Lodi terroir it is grown on... sub-appellations only serve to synergistically support the larger AVA they fall under.”

LAVA co-chair Markus Bokisch in his Vista Luna Vineyard, located in one of Lodi's higher elevation, chunky cobbled AVAs (Borden Ranch-Lodi)

To alleviate fears that usage of sub-AVAs might weaken the hard-won recognition of “Lodi” on wine labels, the petition committee advocated the use of conjunctive language — meaning, names of sub-AVAs placed next to the name of the broader AVA (e.g. "Clements Hills-Lodi" or "Borden Ranch-Lodi"). While Bokisch Vineyards and other Lodi-based wineries have since faithfully adhered to this principle, getting wineries based outside the region to do the same has been challenging. Hence, it is not uncommon to see, say, “Mokelumne River,” “Clements Hills” or “Borden Ranch” used on a label without reference to Lodi. Clearly, some wineries feel that labels that leave out “Lodi” may make a better impression on consumers or media. All the same, the TTB requires that at least 85% of any American-grown wine must come from any AVA indicated on a label.

The back label of LangeTwins Winery's One Hundred Vineyard Petite Sirah furnishes details on appellation, soil, and vineyard management that have a direct impact on the quality and style of wine in the bottle

Next week, check back in to uncover the story of the Mokelumne River Viticultural Area in detail.