Whether you are interested in maximizing winegrape yield, wine quality or both at the same time, understanding vine canopy management is essential to being consistently successful from one year to the next. A properly balanced vine, with the right ratio of shoots and leaves to fruit, is the goal, as well as striving for the right fruit exposure to light and maintaining the fruit within an optimum temperature range. We tend to focus on fruit production when thinking of vine balance, but two other critical elements are production of adequate fruit buds and production of sufficient carbohydrate and nutrient reserves for the following year.