If you're one of the many who have the romantic notion of a winemaker walking through the vineyard on a misty morning, talking to the grapes and assessing the condition of the vineyard, you'll be disappointed to learn that technology has taken over.

Drive down Pelham Road past the Henry of Pelham vineyard and notice a 65-foot tower in the vineyard. It's a weather station which does more than a winemaker's presence could ever do.

The stations (there are two) measure temperature, wind speed, leaf moisture, and precipitation. At any given time -- day or night -- readings flash across vineyard manager Matt Speck's Blackberry and he knows the exact condition of his vineyards.

This means he knows when to spray and when not to spray and -- if vineyard conditions are continually good -- a spray for powdery mildew in the vineyard just won't happen at all.

In the past, grape growers relied on experience to guide them, mostly spraying to be on the safe side. But now with exact measurements of site conditions, no work is done in the vineyard unless the weather machines tell them it's necessary.

Henry of Pelham is not the only vineyard in the peninsula to use this new technology, but it is the one I happened upon. Matt explains the weather machine means less intervention, minimal inputs, increased efficiencies and more control. The weather machine alerts him to perfect icewine picking conditions and warns of threatening spring frosts.

While windmills are there to prevent damage due to late spring and early fall frosts, windmills are only effective if the air above is warmer than the air below. It's called inversion. Then the windmills mix the air to prevent frost damage. But the windmills burn expensive diesel fuel raising the cost of wine. At the Henry of Pelham vineyard site, the windmills have not been turned on in the last five years.

"It's best to know what's happening in the vineyard before we take action", explains Matt, who likes less vineyard intervention because it means extra hours to do other things.

The readings will eventually offer a historical account of vintage years. Then strategic winetastings will actually tell a winemaker how the vineyard is affecting the end flavours in the glass. With statistical data at their fingertips they'll not only be able to claim a dry year, but exactly how dry it really was. Winemakers believe dry years are good for Niagara wines, but is there a window between dry and too dry? What is the exact range of conditions which produce the real premium wines? These are questions that time and technology in the Henry of Pelham vineyard will tell.

Next week: Greening the Henry of Pelham Vineyard.