**1. Introduction**

From the Sumerians to our days, including Egyptians, Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, the Middle Ages, etc., quality wine has been linked to certain regions. This interest in the geographical origin of the wines justifies the *terroir* concept and that its use remains in the general feeling of both popular and market and scientific. The International Organization of Vine and Wine (OIV) in its Resolution VITI 333/2010 [1] collects this idea and defines the *terroir* as follows: "Vitivinicultural *terroir* is a concept which refers to an area in which collective knowledge of the interactions between the identifiable physical and biological environment and applied vitivinicultural practices develops providing distinctive characteristics for the products originating from this area."

The concept of *terroir* began to be used in the fourteenth century for some production properties of high-quality wines in Côte d'Or, Burgundy [2], being difficult to define the ideal factors that make up the *terroir* due to the interaction that exists between them [3]. This complexity of individual natural factor analysis, soil particularly, is gradually overcome with new tools for detection, management, and data analysis. In any case, although the physical and chemical interactions that affect the vineyard are not known with total accuracy, the dissemination of the *terroir* concept is fostering a better knowledge and use of geology, soil, climate, and wine culture for best wine production [2].

The first scientific studies related to the viticultural environment elements and their interactions are carried out in the last quarter of the twentieth century, being able to consider the doctoral thesis of Professor Morlat [4], one of the pioneering studies on the *terroir* zoning in the modern meaning of the term. The aforementioned work takes place in the middle area of the Loire Valley, and European countries have traditionally given more importance to the environment elements in the wine characterization, thus protecting the origin of the wines. Two examples of this tradition are the current classification of Bordeaux wines, which have been practically unchanged since its creation in 1855, and the classification of port wines that were delimited in 1758 (now that zoning has been expanded) and carried out by "Companhia Geral da Agricultura das Vinhas do Alto Douro" (a company similar to the current Regulatory Councils) at the proposal of the Marquis of Pombal.

The globalization of international wine trade has led to increased production, especially in new countries, of varietal and brand wines, and the adoption of lowinput techniques, exerting significant pressure on traditional *terroir* wine producers [5]. Even so, there are many recent scientific publications on the concept of *terroir*, interrelating elements of the environment such as temperature [6], water status [7], light [8], geology [9], soil [10], etc. with the response of the vine.

To study the influence of climate in the vineyard, it is traditional to differentiate between macroclimate, mesoclimate, and microclimate depending on the scale of work. The first refers to the climate of a region and is the main limiting factor for the cultivation of the vine [11], while the mesoclimate is characteristic of a specific topographic and landscape location and affects a set of plants equally in a given geomorphological unit. Finally, the microclimate refers to the vine, surrounds to leaves and clusters and has a great influence in the biological cycle (e.g., it is of great importance in the grape ripening stage), being able to modify through the vineyard management.

Geology and geomorphology allow a synthetic approach adapted to small-scale zonings (≤ 1:50,000), explaining the behavior of the vine only indirectly [12]. The geological or geomorphological maps are useful as a first approximation to the *terroir* zoning, since very different soils can be included in the same map unit, so it is necessary to determine the types of soil [13]. For this reason, many of the approaches to viticultural zoning borrow their approach from pedological cartography, with some variants [14].

The soil study methodology is specified in the genesis of the soil taxonomic units (STU) and the soil map (or cartographic) units (SMU) during the process of their recognition. The processing of the information generated in the different layers of information by a geographic information system (GIS) results in the quantification of the contents and the possibility of their statistical treatment [15]. This methodology has been and continues to be used as part of the *terroir* zoning of both smallscale viticultural regions (macrozoning), for example, 1:50,000 or 1:25,000, and in vineyards or sets of smaller vineyards at larger scales (microzonifications) between 1:5000 and 1:10,000.

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tillage.

*Terroir Zoning: Influence on Grapevine Response (Vitis vinifera L.) at Within-vineyard…*

Depending on the scale used in the zoning of the environment elements, mainly climate and soil, we will talk about macro (below 1:25,000), meso (between 1:25.000 and 1:10,000), or micro *terroir* zoning (above 1: 5000). Once the meso or micro *terroir* zoning has been carried out, the management of the vineyard is susceptible of being executed according to the environment homogeneous unit

The cartographic delimitation of vineyard sectors or EHUs and its individualized management is the basis of precision viticulture (PV), a vineyard management technique that relies mainly on remote sensing [16], to monitor and manage the spatial variability of the vineyard [17–19]. The images obtained by remote sensing are the basis for the creation of maps [20–23], such as the cartographic representation of the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) [20]; providing important information, they are very affordable, they facilitate the precision of the limits of the conventional zoning, and they are obtained more quickly than those made from the traditional zoning method [24]. These images are characterized by their temporal, spatial, and spectral resolutions and have been used in meso- and micro-

In the present work, a methodology of NDVI integration in *terroir* zoning is proposed, redefining the cartographic limits of traditional microzoning. Once these sectors, EHU, or micro *terroirs* are defined, the behavior of the vineyard (yield, vigor, and grape composition) is related to the main factors that characterize them.

The experimental work is carried out for 4 consecutive years (2012, 2013, 2014, and 2015) in four vineyards (A, B, C, and D) located at an average distance of 2 km from each other, in the municipality of Oyón (Álava). The vineyards are protected by the DOCa Rioja, appellation of origin associated with the Ebro River, and located

Regarding the climate of the area where the vineyards are framed, the rainfall

Multicriteria System of Climatic Classification (MSCC) [28], the climate is warm temperate (HI + 1), of cool nights (CI + 1) and moderately dry (DI + 1). Although the dominant wind is from the west, another typical northwest wind (known as

A zoning is carried out under viticultural criteria (variety and vine age) in the four vineyards, and in the resulting subplots, a FIA was drawn from digital orthophotographs of 0.25 meters of spectral resolution [31], discriminating sectors (A1, A2, A3 for vineyard A and analogously for the rest of the vineyards) on a scale of 1:2500, that is, on a vineyard scale. In each sector, 12 vines are marked, divided into 2 repetitions of 6 plants. Measurements of vegetative growth and yield are carried out, as well as physical-chemical analysis of the grape on each repetition. For the pedological study, a pit is made next to each of the repetitions of six vines,

The greater part of the vineyards of the area is grown on sandstone and lutites of Haro's facies (Middle-Upper Miocene) [29]. Some of the soils found on this geology and their associated quaternary system are [30] alfisols (e.g., Calcic Haploxeralf subgroup), entisols (e.g., Typic Xerofluvent subgroup), or inceptisols (e.g., Typic Xerocrept subgroup). For more details of the study area, see [9]. The grape cultivar is Tempranillo, grafted on 41B, and the vines are trained using a single trellis system (bilateral cordon Royat pruning), with 2976 vines/ha, and soil management is by

and 13.7°C and during the vegetative

and 18.1°C, respectively. According to the

zonifications since the end of the twentieth century [25–27].

*DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86444*

(EHU) defined by it.

**2. Material and methods**

in the northern third of the Iberian Peninsula.

and average annual temperature are 459 L m<sup>−</sup><sup>2</sup>

*cierzo*) has influence during the grape ripening.

period (April–October) are 260 L m<sup>−</sup><sup>2</sup>

*Terroir Zoning: Influence on Grapevine Response (Vitis vinifera L.) at Within-vineyard… DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.86444*

Depending on the scale used in the zoning of the environment elements, mainly climate and soil, we will talk about macro (below 1:25,000), meso (between 1:25.000 and 1:10,000), or micro *terroir* zoning (above 1: 5000). Once the meso or micro *terroir* zoning has been carried out, the management of the vineyard is susceptible of being executed according to the environment homogeneous unit (EHU) defined by it.

The cartographic delimitation of vineyard sectors or EHUs and its individualized management is the basis of precision viticulture (PV), a vineyard management technique that relies mainly on remote sensing [16], to monitor and manage the spatial variability of the vineyard [17–19]. The images obtained by remote sensing are the basis for the creation of maps [20–23], such as the cartographic representation of the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) [20]; providing important information, they are very affordable, they facilitate the precision of the limits of the conventional zoning, and they are obtained more quickly than those made from the traditional zoning method [24]. These images are characterized by their temporal, spatial, and spectral resolutions and have been used in meso- and microzonifications since the end of the twentieth century [25–27].

In the present work, a methodology of NDVI integration in *terroir* zoning is proposed, redefining the cartographic limits of traditional microzoning. Once these sectors, EHU, or micro *terroirs* are defined, the behavior of the vineyard (yield, vigor, and grape composition) is related to the main factors that characterize them.
