Ron and Barb Corey of Corning. Behind them is only a small section of their vineyard.
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Ron and Barb Corey enjoy a glass of good wine – made from their own grapes!
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Ron and Barb Corey of Corning. Behind them is only a small section of their vineyard. |
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| Ron and Barb Corey beside one of two "large" wine barrels which help decorate the Corning Winery. |
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| Ron spends a lot of time keeping up with the mowing. The vineyards are very labor intensive with pruning, spraying, and picking all done by hand. |
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| Wine from Corning Winery has won awards at several international competitions. |
Barb Corey of Corning says her husband “loves to talk about his grapes.” Five minutes into the conversation and you realize that Ron Corey lives up to his wife’s description. This former banker turned wine-maker remains true to his farm roots. The 2,700 plants, encompassing six varieties of grapes, which surround the couple’s rural Corning home is evidence of that, although Ron speaks rather modestly about the vineyard’s beginnings.
“We had the land and we mowed all the time,” Ron begins to explain. “We started planting grapes and then more grapes and finally we had more grapes than we could drink, so we decided to sell our wine commercially. It really was just kind of a hobby that got out of hand.”
Hobby gone wild is a mild description. Trellis upon trellis of grapes surround the Corey home, drive, and pond. Ron estimates the couple’s five acres of grapes (2,700 plants) produces 20,000 to 30,000 pounds of grapes each year. That will produce 20,000 to 25,000 bottles of wine. That may sound large to some, but Ron notes that the Corning Winery is small, “as wineries go.”
Unlike some crops where mechanization replaces human hands, growing grapes remains very labor intense.
“It’s hard farming,” Ron explains. “It’s old style farming. You use your hands and your back. You’ll touch every one of these plants at least three times a year.”
Grapes must be closely monitored for fungus and sprayed approximately every seven days. Birds are another issue; vineyard rows must be netted to prevent birds from harvesting the crop before the winemaker does. The trellis rows must be mowed regularly and the plants must be pruned at the beginning of each growing season. Not to mention, that grapes are picked by hand.
“People don’t realize how much work it is,” Ron says. “But I like being outside.”
“And we love living here,” Barb adds. “You can get a glass of wine, walk through there (gesturing to the vineyard) and feel like you’re in California!”
Growing the grapes is only one part of the equation, however. Converting those grapes into wine is another. Wine from the Corning Winery has won eight medals in recent competitions, something that Ron and Barb point to with pride. Their efforts are paying off.
“Every grape has its own characteristics as to what it will do,” Ron explains. “You try to pick when the grapes are at a high brix, meaning high sugar content. Red grapes take at least a year to go through the fermentation process. White grapes can be picked and in a bottle within 6-9 months.”
Ron describes the fermentation process as pure chemistry or the “really super complicated part of wine-making.”
“You put 500 gallons (of grape juice) in a tank and you can’t see it,” he says. “I guarantee one of two things is going to happen. The wine is either going to get better or worse!”
Throughout the process, Ron is constantly checking the wine, testing for various chemical levels: each level indicates a good or bad direction and undesirable traits can be offset by the right chemical treatment. Also, there is the “human” test as Ron siphons out a small amount of the wine to see if the numbers are right.
“We have a two-way between the winery and the house,” Barb explains. “I always know something’s wrong when I’m making breakfast and Ron calls me and asks, ‘Can you come out to the winery for a minute?’ I know that means he wants me to test a wine sample to see if whatever he’s doing is working.”
“You really know you’re a winemaker when something happens in the wine and you pull the plug and dump 500 gallons down the drain,” Ron says. “We’ve only had to do that twice.”
Wine from Corning Winery is bottled and packaged on-site and is now sold in about 35 stores. Ron and Barb plan to add a tasting room to the winery, which will be floating--pontoon style--in their pond.
“That’s our next big adventure,” Ron explains. “It will be large enough for about 200 people.”
Both Ron and Barb say they received a favorable response from the community when they began this adventure and are content with its progress. They like having “total control” over their product, from grapes in the vineyard to wine-making in the winery.
“Wine is made in the vineyard, period,” Ron says matter-of-factly. “Having total control makes for better wine. We grow about 95% of the grapes that end up as juice in our bottles.”
What’s ahead for the Corning Winery? More of the same. Properly maintained, grape plants will grow and produce grapes for years.
“These plants will be here, producing grapes, long after we are gone,” Ron says.
For more information about the Corning Winery, or for a tour, contact Ron and Barb at: 641-322-3193.