Bethel Heights Vineyard
Founded in: 1977
Website: bethelheights.com
Specialties: Pinot Noir, Chardonnay, Pinot Gris, Pinot Blanc
What is an example of a small change we could all make to make the planet a better place? Turn off all the lights during dinner and eat by candlelight – saves electricity and lets everyone practice being charming and beautiful and civilized for a while.
What is the one thing that you’d like to be remembered for? Always putting family first – the business exists for the family, not vice versa!
Early Advocate of Sustainability Encourages Oregon Wine Industry to Continuously Improve
Bethel Heights has been actively working toward being sustainable since the first vineyard plantings in 1977, but accordingly to Pat Dudley, the concept and meaning of sustainability has evolved.
“We always tried to not use chemicals and not disrupt nature,” she says. “We were amateurs, and may not have had the complexities worked out, but we had the spirit and were certainly sympathetic environmentalists.”
More modern, conventional agricultural techniques to control birds and weeds arrived in Oregon, and like the Ponzi family, Dudley and her family experimented with more conventional applications.
“We gradually learned that common practices were actually toxic and unacceptable,” she says. “There was a gradual dawning that farming in this country was not healthy for the land or the creatures that lived on the land, including the people. “
Dudley and her husband Ted, together with twin brother Terry and wife Marilyn, were soon setting an example for the Oregon wine industry. Bethel Heights received an award from the Polk County Soil & Water Conservation District for their cover crop experiment, at a time when clean cultivation was still considered standard in the industry.
“There was a high learning curve, but our intentions were to keep wildlife (insects, birds, bees, bugs) healthy on the farm, instead of trying to eradicate them,” Dudley says.
Ted Casteel was a founding member of LIVE, working to develop vineyard standards and bringing growers who hadn’t previously shown interested in sustainable practices, into the conversation. For her part, Dudley says she has just “tried to gently push people forward.”
Dudley has been a loud voice for third-party certification programs such as LIVE and OCSW.
“The point of getting certified is that you have to keep track of what you’re doing,” she says. “It’s not a one- time task. If you don’t measure, count, report and get audited, you don’t know what you’re doing. You learn by keeping track and seeing how to do things a different way. And we’re still looking for the whole answer. The next step is how to measure sustainability outside the individual farm or vineyard. We need to find practices to make the entire planet more sustainable.”
Today, Dudley and her family are motivated by the realization the planet is in trouble.
“Everyone must do their part to reverse the direction, and the Oregon wine industry is in a leadership position. Our direct relationships with consumers allow us to have the conversations that change minds. We’re sending a clear message to the people who promote, distribute, sell and consume our wine that our practices are helping to achieve their goals; telling them that we support their values and ask them to support ours.”
Dudley and Bethel Heights are keenly aware of how far they still have to go – addressing the Oregon Governor’s Carbon Neutral Challenge; how to make the original winery, built in the 80s, more sustainable; and addressing the processing, packaging and marketing, transportation stages.
“We’ve been in the same place for 30 years, and living among the vineyards makes you tune into the details every day,” Dudley says. “It’s easier to see the gradual changes, to see what is stable and what isn’t, to see the things that live and flourish here, as opposed to what we try to push onto the land.”
Order Oregon Certified Sustainable Wines
2008 Chardonnay Unoaked
2008 Estate Grown Chardonnay
2008 Estate Grown Pinot Noir
2008 Pinot Blanc Estate Grown
2008 Pinot Noir Casteel Reserve
2008 Pinot Noir Flat Block
2008 Pinot Noir Justice Vineyard
2008 Pinot Noir Southeast Block
2008 Pinot Noir West Block
2008 Pinot Noir Carter Vineyard
2009 Bethel Heights Vineyard Chardonnay Unoaked
2009 Bethel Heights Vineyard Grüner Veltliner
2009 Bethel Heights Vineyard Pinot Blanc Estate
2009 Bethel Heights Vineyard Pinot Noir Rosé
2009 Bethel Heights Vineyard Riesling