(AP) - Western Colorado’s wine-grape crop faces another blow this year after record-low cold temperatures earlier this month killed vines and grape buds across the valley.

“It’s been really cold and it was very early,” said state viticulturist Horst Caspari at Colorado State University’s Western Colorado Research Center on Orchard Mesa. “Our temperatures (in early December) were 18 to 20 degrees lower than normal.”

Grapevines, as do all plants, need some time to acclimate to cold temperatures — to become cold hardy — before they can resist the coldest parts of winter.

This year, however, some of the late-ripening grape varieties, such as merlot and gewürztraminer, were caught by the early cold.

Only twice since 2009 have valley grape growers seen a full crop.

“Merlot doesn’t like it that cold,” Caspari noted. “There are a lot of blocks (of merlot grapes) being pulled out.”

Growers around the valley already are reporting damage to this year’s crop.

“We definitely are going to have some significant damage, it’s been so cold for so long and got cold pretty quickly,” said Nancy Janes at Whitewater Hill Vineyards. “It seems like it’s getting colder faster in the fall and not allowing some grapes to get winter hardy.

“Other factors also play into that but we’ve seen a lot early extremely cold events.”

Caspari agreed, saying his record keeping indicates the deep cold has been arriving earlier the past few years.