A 4‐week advance in the growing season in Napa Valley, California,USA

Abstract

AbstractThe growing season start and duration, along with other temperature‐related measures of importance to premium wine grapes in Napa Valley, California have changed as climate over the western United States has warmed. The growing season start has varied from year to year with a standard deviation of about 3 weeks, but over the 1958–2016 record a linear fit to the time sequence shows it advanced by more than 4 weeks. Over the study period, advances in the growing season were strongly influenced by temperature increases beginning in the late 1960s with warm anomalies generally persisting through recent years. The date upon which the growing season accumulated 1400 growing degree‐days also shifted earlier by about 4 weeks. Other measures swung to a warmer status, including the mean temperature of the last 45 days of the growing season, which warmed by over 1.5°C. Warming days and especially warming nights contributed to the growing season advance as well as trends towards warmer expressions of other viticultural measures. Years with earlier and warmer growing seasons experienced a substantial reduction in the number of daily cool extremes, and an increase in daily warm extremes, including the number of days whose temperature reaches or exceeds 35°C.