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F.A.Q.
FILED BY CRISS ROBERTS, SEPT. 18, 2006
FORT MADISON — Mike Pence has a multitude of dreams and all of them grow from the fledgling roots of the vineyard outside his door.
"Five years ago, I started making this home kit wine," said Pence, a western Illinois native who has settled in the Fort Madison hometown of wife, Kathy.
Those bottles tasted good enough that Pence felt safe sharing them with friends, who, after the first taste, called him a liar.
"They'd say 'You didn't make this,' " he said, pouring a glass of white. "I took that as a compliment."
Heartland Harvest Winery, 2116 290th Ave., Fort Madison,
Telephone: (319) 372-0909
Open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. weekends and by appointment. It is selling eight varieties this fall:
• A dry Rosetta
• Concord
• Niagra
• Pink Catawba
• Cherry
• Blueberry
• Cranberry
• Peach
INSIDE:
He understood where they were coming from, though. As a kid, he'd tasted the wine his father and grandfather made. "It tasted like cough medicine."
Pence clearly had the passion and the knack, one he shared with friend
Tracy Murphy. They were both farm kids who worked in the Great River Medical Center pathology department where Pence is the anatomic pathology supervisor and Murphy was a pathologist until moving to Wyoming last year with wife, Debbie. The two couples began daydreaming over a bottle of wine one night and the idea of Heartland Harvest Winery was born.
In late August, they poured the winery's inaugural offering of six varieties at an open house, the first of 10,000 bottles sold under the
Heartland Harvest label.
"Iowa used to be the sixth leading state in the country producing wine,"
Pence said, quoting figures from Iowa State University's Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture. Wine producting in Iowa has almost tripled from 51,500 in June 2002 to 133,728 galons in December 2005, with 55 wineries
licensed at that time. New wineries are licensed almost monthly.
And while Iowa, on the whole, is limited in the types of grapes it can
grow, Pence was excited to find that his corner of the state may be able to produce wine varieties found in coastal regions or Europe.
"Here, and in southwest Iowa, we have a microclimate that may allow us to grow different varieties," he said.
With 22 grape varieties on five acres in rural Fort Madison, Pence expects to be making wine from his own juice in three years. He planted the grapes two years ago, nurturing them from infancy in a greenhouse he and Kathy man at their home. It takes five years for the grapes to produce.
In the meantime, they're importing juice to ferment from New York and
seeking bulk quantities of grapes and fruits from local growers to ferment
on-site.
This fall, they'll offer four grape-based varieties — a dry rosetta, Concord, Niagra and pink Catawba — as well as four fruit wines — cherry, blueberry, cranberry and peach. Prices should range from $10 to $12 a
bottle.
"When we get up and going, we'll have 22 grape wines and 12 fruit wines," Pence said.
His plan is to produce an additional 500 gallons a year for the next five
years, at which point they'll have outgrown their present building.
The winery will play host to wine-related events in the future "I want to promote the winery, but I want to promote fruit and grape growth in Iowa, too," he said.
Criss Roberts is features editor at the Hawkeye in Burlington and a veteran Iowa journalist whose work has appeared in newspapers in Sheldon, Fairfield and Burlington as well as other publications.
Five year trip from basement to winery for Iowa's newest vinter
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