Spring Tune-Up and Trade Show

Dr. Wendy McFadden-Smith is the Tender Fruit and Grape IPM Specialist with Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs. She is also an Adjunct Professor of biological sciences and a professional affiliate of the Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute, both at Brock University. Her research interests are wide and varied and depend very much on the needs and priorities of the tree fruit and grape industries in Ontario. While her specialization is in fungal diseases, she has also worked on biology and management of arthropod pests and viral diseases.

Dr. Matt Clark is an Associate Professor of grape breeding and enology at the University of Minnesota. His focus is on developing cold-hardy and disease resistant grapes for wine production as well as for fresh eating. His lab has been studying the genetic control of resistance to phylloxera, an insect pest that affects native grape leaves. He is Project Director for VitisGen3, a national research project on breeding for powdery mildew resistance. He has incorporated routine marker-assisted selection using DNA testing to screen plants for important traits of interest.

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Justine Vanden Heuvel is a Professor of Viticulture and Chair of the Horticulture Section in the School of Integrative Plant Science at Cornell University. Her research focuses on improving the environmental and economic sustainability of winegrowing in cool climates.  Justine teaches the upper-level Viticulture courses at Cornell, including The Science of Grapevines and Advanced Viticulture.

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Steven Trussler is the Micro-Credential Coordinator at Brock University’s Cool Climate Oenology and Viticulture Institute. He specializes in wine and cider education, developing and delivering professional and continuing education programming related to wine and cider production, sensory evaluation, and laboratory analysis among others. He spent 7 years working as a commercial winemaker and continues to do consulting work within the wine and cider industries. Most recently, he has been working on completing his PhD in Education at the University of Toronto.

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Eleanor Cook is the Executive Director of Visit The County, PEC's Destination Marketing and Management Organization (DMMO). Prior to joining the organization, she worked in leading strategic destination development with many municipalities in her role with a Provincial Regional Tourism Organization (RTO). Regenerative tourism development has been a journey from the boardroom to the classroom, from field-professional to Professor, allowing Eleanor to shape Ontario's tourism scene, and mentoring graduates to be future leaders in tourism destination development and marketing.

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John Szabo is the first Canadian Master Sommelier and he holds the WSET Diploma with honours. He’s seen the hospitality business from all sides including cooking and washing dishes, serving and sommellerie, importing, teaching, writing ,photographing, speaking, emceeing, consulting and judging wine internationally. He was listed as “Canada’s best-known sommelier” in Meininger’s Wine Business International.  

Today, John is a partner and principal critic for WineAlign.com, Canada’s largest wine publication, and buyer for the WineAlign Exchange wine club, as well ascolumnist at Modalina and MarQuee magazines. Most recently, he joined the team at CellArt as content contributor (words and wine!), a company fusing art andd esign with function in one-of-a-kind luxury wine cellars. John is co-host of the newly launched podcast Wine Thieves with WineAlign partner Sara d’Amato. He also contributes occasionally to Wine & Spirits Magazine and freelances for publications such as Meininger’s, Wine Enthusiast, Canopy, and VinCe Magazine.

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