Soil affected the variations in grape and wine properties along the eastern foot of Helan Mountain, China

ABSTRACT

Four vineyards from the eastern foot of Helan Mountain within the same climate classification, where the planted grapes were 4-year-old Cabernet Sauvignon, were selected for investigating the difference in grape and wine properties. Results showed that the grapes of Lilan vineyard had a higher sugar content and sugar–acid ratio than Huida, Yuquan and Zhihuiyuanshi vineyards. The grapes of Zhihuiyuanshi vineyard had the highest tannin and total phenols content. Concerning the wines, the wine of Yuquan vineyard had low pH but had a great ageing potential, and wine of Zhihuiyuanshi vineyard had highest tone, chroma, tannins, total phenols and alcohol content than other vineyards. Soil pH was positively correlated with anthocyanins in the grapes and negatively correlated with total acid in wine. The microbial biomass carbon (MBC) was correlated with the anthocyanins in grape. Microbial biomass nitrogen (MBN) was positively correlated with soluble solid in grapes, and positively correlated with tannin and total phenols in the wine. The MBC/MBN ratio was negatively correlated with tone in the wine. Our findings indicate that adjusting soil pH and choosing microbial fertiliser with high soil microbial carbon and nitrogen nutrients are effective ways to improve the quality of regional grapes and wine.

KEYWORDS:

• Soil texture
• soil pH
• vineyard
• soil microbial biomass nutrition
• wine terroirs

Acknowledgments

Authors thank professor Shukla, New Mexico State University, for review the English and editing the manuscript.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Yanbing Qi is an associate professor at the College of Natural Resources and Environment, Northwest A&F University, and researches on GIS and soil quality evaluation.

Rui Wang is an associate professor at the School of Agricultural, Ningxia University, and researches on plant nutrition.

Qianru Qin is a master student at the College of Natural Resources and Environment, Northwest A&F University.

Quan Sun is a professor at the School of Agricultural, Ningxia University, and researches on plant nutrition.

Additional information

Funding

This research was funded by the Key Technologies Research and Development Program of Ningxia (2016BZ0602); and the National Nature Science Foundation of China (41877007).