Behind the Bottle: Some unlikely facts from the world of wineIn Bali, 10-year-old Hatten Winery lists not only the year of the vintage but the month - the grapes grow so fast in the tropical environment that they have 12 or more vintages each year. You may have seen bottles with screwcaps instead of corks, but bottle caps? Pierre Frick, a well-respected winery in Alsace, France, has begun bottling his wines with the same kind of stainless steel caps you usually see on beer bottles. Ancient pottery remains show that wine was being made by Neolithic humans 8,000 years ago - and they used tree resins to keep the wine from going bad. While the well-known Cabernet Sauvignon is the most planted red grape in the world, you've probably never heard of the most planted white, Airén. Almost all of it is planted in Spain; they use it to make dry white wines and brandy. A Canadian company has developed a new way of keeping birds from eating grapes in the vineyards: a camera watches the vineyard and sends out robots that screech bird distress calls at invading avians. August Haraszthy was one of the major players in developing the California wine scene back in the 1800s. He didn't hang around, though, and left to make rum in Nicaragua, where he disappeared from history when he fell into a stream infested with alligators. |
