Abstract
Abstract. Viticulture has long been essential to the commercial and social well-being of parts of the Czech Lands (now the Czech Republic), and detailed records have been kept for centuries of the timing and relative success of the grape crop. Using such documentary data from the Bohemian wine-growing region (mainly northwest of the capital, Prague), series of grape-harvest dates (GHDs) were created for the 1499–2015 period. Because the link between harvest dates and temperatures is strong, GHD series, together with instrumental mean temperature series starting in 1801, were used to reconstruct mean April–August temperatures for the region from 1499 to 2015. Linear regression (LR) and variance scaling (VS) methods were used for calibration and compared in terms of explained variance and their ability to capture extreme values. It emerged that LR does not significantly underestimate temperature variability. However, VS shows far greater capacity to capture extremes. GHDs explain 64 % of temperature variability over the full calibration period. The 1986–2015 period was identified as the warmest 30-year period of the past 514 years, an observation consistent with recent global warming. The highest April–August temperatures appeared in a reconstruction for the year 1540, which was warmer than the next two very warm, and far more recent, seasons in 2003 and 2015. The coldest period occurred at the beginning of the 20th century (1900–1929). The series reconstructed for the Czech Lands is in close agreement with other (central) European reconstructions based on other proxies. The series created here makes an important contribution to a better understanding of long-term spatiotemporal temperature variability in central Europe.
Highlights
A specific set of climatic circumstances is crucial to the achievement of complete vine grape maturation, and climate variability determines year-to-year differences in the yield and quality of the wine produced (Jones and Hellman, 2003)
The beginning of the grape harvest depends on the weather patterns of the preceding months and the closest relationship with grape-harvest dates (GHDs) in the 1811–2010 period appeared for mean April–August temperatures (r2 = 0.64)
April–August temperature reconstruction for the Czech Lands based on GHDs in the 1499–2015 period constitutes a further important contribution to the better understanding of long-term spatiotemporal temperature variability in central Europe, as well as in the broader European context
Summary
A specific set of climatic circumstances is crucial to the achievement of complete vine grape maturation, and climate variability determines year-to-year differences in the yield and quality of the wine produced (Jones and Hellman, 2003). Temperature and solar irradiance are critical variables, since they have a direct effect on the length of the growing season, phenological stages, grape yields, and the synthesis and accumulation of sugars, organic acids, polyphenols, vitamins, and aromatic compounds in the berries (Jones et al, 2005; Keller, 2010). The warming trend in recent climate change has accelerated ripening and induced changes in grape composition (Jones et al, 2012). Grape-harvest dates (GHDs) are well suited to the reconstruction of interannual variations in spring and summer temperatures over large parts of Europe. The prevailing temperatures during the stages before flowering and veraison (color and profound composition changes) have been established as the most influential upon GHDs (Chuine et al, 2004; Garcia de Cortázar-Atauri et al, 2010). GDHs have been used for the reconstruction of temperature series in France (Le Roy Ladurie and Baulant, 1980; Chuine et al, 2004; Le Roy Ladurie, 2005; Menzel, 2005; Etien et al, 2008; Garnier et al, 2010), Switzerland (Pfister, 1981, 1984; Burkhardt and Hense, 1985; Meier et al, 2007; Wetter and Pfister, 2013), Germany (Glaser and Hagedorn, 1991), Austria (Strömmer, 2003; Maurer et al, 2009), Italy
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