Phenology forecasts, disease risk and block weather
Every vineyard block gets date predictions for the key growth stages and a daily disease-risk read-out, computed from real weather at the block's own location. These are free features on every plan — you just need a block with a location.
What you get
Open a block from /vineyard/blocks and scroll to the 📅 Phenology forecast & disease risk panel. It shows:
| Item | What it means |
|---|---|
| Forecast table | Predicted dates for budburst, flowering, veraison and harvest, alongside any actual dates you've recorded, with the model used and a confidence figure. |
| Disease badges | Powdery mildew risk band with a 0–100 index, downy mildew (with a "scout by" date when an infection window is active) and black rot infection conditions. |
| ✦ marker | The forecast for that stage has been calibrated against your own observations. |
The models are deterministic and published science: a growing-degree-day (GDD) accumulation for budburst and the Grapevine Flowering Véraison (GFV) model for flowering and veraison, tuned per variety. Nothing is guessed — if there isn't enough weather data yet, the panel says so rather than inventing dates.
Give the block a location
Weather is fetched nightly, automatically, for each block's coordinates. If the panel says no forecast is available yet, the block has no location: edit it in the Block Register and enter its position in the Latitude and Longitude fields under Where is this block? — long-press the spot in Google Maps to copy the two numbers. (The optional GeoJSON boundary field is only for a polygon outline from a mapping tool.) After the next nightly ingest the forecasts appear on their own. You can review the accumulated weather under /vineyard/weather.
Teach it your site
Forecasts self-calibrate. When a stage actually happens in the field, record it:
- On the block detail page, open the phenology tab.
- Press + Record Stage, pick the stage (BUD BURST, FLOWERING, VERAISON, HARVEST and so on) and the date you observed it.
- Save.
Observed stages appear in the Actual column, and future predictions for later stages shift to match your site's real behaviour — marked with ✦ so you know which forecasts are running on your own data. The more seasons you log, the sharper the dates get.
Using the disease panel
Check the badges before planning canopy work or sprays. A HIGH powdery band or an active downy infection window with a "scout by" date is a prompt to walk the rows and log what you find on the scouting tab. The Open calendar → link takes you to the calendar, where the same forecasts anchor your seasonal task templates.
All of this — forecasts, disease risk, GDD tracking and nightly weather — is included on the free plan, which covers 2 blocks.
Guidance, not instructions
Everything on this page is an estimate produced by general agronomic models from weather data, and the panel says so where you read it. The models are published and citable — that is the point of using them — but they are general, and your vineyard is not: canopy management, local topography, resistance history and what your neighbours sprayed all matter, and none of them are inputs.
MakeWine never tells you to spray, and never names a product or a dose. It tells you a risk threshold was crossed and suggests when to go and look. Always verify against your own observations, local conditions, label directions and the regulations that apply to you — the decision, and the responsibility for it, rest with you.