Below an ashen hillside, farmer Johnnie White picked shriveled grapes off flaking vines, surveying for the third time in a decade the ravages of a wildfire on Napa Valley vineyards. Nearby, fire crews stamped out remnants of the Pickett Fire, which started Aug. 21 in Calistoga and burned around 6,800 acres at the northeast end of the valley.
“There are some vineyards that got quite a bit of fire damage,” said White, a sixth-generation winegrape grower who manages vineyards across Napa Valley. “And then there’s concern about the smoke.”
In recent years, wildfire smoke has caused major losses for the renowned wine region. In 2020, fires cost California’s wine sector an estimated $3.7 billion, with smoke from that year’s Glass Fire and other blazes tainting entire crops in Napa Valley…