Small Tractor for Vineyard Row Maintenance

Small Tractor for Vineyard Row Maintenance

Paul Hoover is the Land Manager for Hark Vineyards in Earlysville, VA. The farm winery estate consists of 80 acres of land, with a little under 20 acres being cultivated for wine growing.

Paul describes the challenges of mowing steep hillsides on this particular property, like most of the land in Central Virginia. As an operating vineyard, they have to mow and navigate with tractors and sprayers on hillsides and even wet areas of the property as well.

Paul thinks the Ventrac is the most versatile piece of equipment they have as it serves as their primary mower, bush hog, and more.
They even use their Ventrac to quickly and efficiently move equipment around the property. Moving things like harvest trailers, firewood, propane tanks, shuttling new rootstock out to the vineyard workers are all in a day's work for the Ventrac. Ultimately, the Ventrac's versatility helps Hark Vineyards speed up their harvest operation and keep things running smoothly.

Paul enjoys the maneuverability of the Ventrac in the vineyard rows. The small and compact nature of the unit combined with the maneuverability of the attachments means it's his first choice when maintaining vineyard rows. Larger equipment is a disadvantage because any contact with the grapevines or trellis can cause damage to the plant's ability to produce.

In addition, the heavier footprint of a larger tractor over time does a lot of damage to the ground, resulting in ruts and uneven terrain on the vineyard landscape. Paul has noted that even with repetitive running over the ground, the Ventrac does not damage the ground with its light footprint.
Paul explains why it's important that the Ventrac offers rear discharge options for mowing because, in a vineyard row, grass clippings cannot be thrown onto the grapevines.

To reduce disease, it's common practice to remove the previous year's grapevines from the trellis. Once gathered, the old vines would be collected and removed from the rows, but Paul now uses the Flail Mower to chop up the vines and mulch them back into the rows, providing further nutrients for the soil.


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[breakheartorchard]

Hah. You guys were 20 miles from us. We will be picking up our 4500z this week.

[joseph-urks]

it would be grate to see ventrack represented in farming simulator 22 it now has vinyards and alot of real farmers see and use equipment on the game in real life

[pepemumford]

Just finished a day of mowing our newly planted steep woodland on a 4500Y. Thank you for such amazing machine, nothing else could do it so efficiently and safely with the temperamental english weather. How would i get Ventrac merchandise/clothing as there wasn’t any shipping to the UK on the website.

[tomgoul]

Getting my Ventrac in the spring and very interested in what you use to spray herbicides? I'm am getting the Spyker spreader but unsure on a sprayer.

[TyinAlaska]

Can it run a post pounder and a 16" auger? Thanks.