Rains end Napa/Sonoma harvest

Ready or not, here comes winter, and with it the end to the 2010 growing season in not-so-sunny Northern California.

It has been a bizarre year, with an exceptionally chilly growing season, cool summer, grape-roasting heat for three days in August, and atypically low yields.

As I write this, it is raining in Sonoma and Napa counties, and this storm follows one a week ago that dumped as many as 7 inches (178 mm) of rain over a two-day period in Northern California. Weather forecasters warned growers and winemakers of this storm, and many vintners harvested just before the drenching...