The facts:
As is customary before expressing opinions and/or views, we wanted to gather some information first. We therefore visited the web site of the Fattoria di Piazzano – Empoli (Province of Florence) Tuscany – Italy (http://www.fattoriadipiazzano.it/?Lingua=EN ) to get some ideas.

What we were struck, and pleasurably unnerved by, the most were several individual passages in the reading of the text which we found on the site.

The sensation that we felt can be summarized in saying that the Bettarini’s seem to be stating the land and the vineyards have taken on a certain form of animal life and are therefore not to be considered as simple “objects” incapable of communicating, but as living creatures with which to engage in pleasurable dialogues, telling stories and exchanging feelings and memories, possibly of the decision to permanently settle in that place when the hunt or belligerence came to an end.

It tells of skeletons and of farms, of paleolithics and of centuriation but also of respect with all that surrounds us making us appreciate the beautiful things in life. Fantastic!

And how can the philosophy go unnoticed ?  Oh such Epicurus, despite the memory having liberated space to hold other information, it brings many “voluptuous” considerations and perceptions to our senses. Well we are in Tuscany Chianti area and so we feel it unwittingly. Re-opening our eyes….

….The Fattoria di Piazzano is a wine farm owned by Mr. Rolando Bettarini and Ilaria & C.

Situated in the hills overlooking the town of Empoli, it is composed of about 64 hectares, 33 of which is invested in vineyards, 6 of these being olive tree groves and the rest occupied by woodland and rural and civil buildings.

Mr. Bettarini looks after both the technical management of the vineyards and that of the wine in the cellars. He was introduced to the technology of the Martignani company during the EIMA Ag Show (www.eima.it ) in Bologna in the year 2000 and in the following season purchased the first 2/two  “Martignani-KWH” Whirlwind B612 (1000 l capacity each) Low Volume Mist Blowers currently used in the farm.

For phytopathologic protection Mr. Bettarini has always instructed his collaborators to treat in “alternate rows”, that is to pass along a row with the tractor pull Mist Blower, skip the following row, and re-enter into the next.

The volumes applied during the treatments are of about 90 l/ha (regardless of the type of treatment: (anti mildew, anti-oidium , etc..) due to the fact that, with a single refill, that is 1000 liter, the operator covered about 10,5 ha at a speed of 5.5 km/h and managed to complete the treatment in 2.5/3 days. This is thought to be an excellent productive result considering the particular situation of the majority of  Tuscan companies divided in to several distant plots of land with various difficulties in manoeuvring at the ends of the rows caused by considerable slopes.

While using the two Martignani Mist Blowers simultaneously, the times reduced dramatically by almost half (one and a half days).

Mr. Bettarini was therefore able to notice that, thanks to the use of the Martignani-KWH pneumatic Mist Blowers, the time lost in the refills and in transfers was visibly reduced, but the greatest advantage was that of obtaining a greater efficiency and timing of the phytopathologic treatments, which is a very important characteristic nowadays considering the increase in today’s meteorologically unpredictable and adverse seasons.

It is important to note that in the phytoiatric management of the vineyard, Mr. Bettarini preserves the same anti-parasitical mixture volumes (90 l/ha) for both fungicide and insecticide treatments.
Once again Tuscany, once again a centre!