(Wine-Searcher) - Piedmont appears to have weathered Italy's 2014 harvest best, but it's a sadder story elsewhere.

Italian winemakers have been vexed this year by one of the wettest and most "bizarre" vintages in recent memory, as one producer put it.

Across Italy, an extremely mild winter accelerated the growing cycle causing a premature onset of ripening. An unusually cool summer slowed it down. But the lower temperatures also brought overly abundant rainfall throughout Italy that hampered ripening and led to widespread vine disease.

In wine powerhouse regions like Puglia and Sicily to the south, trade observers predict a 30 percent decrease in production compared to last year.

In Prosecco, in northeastern Italy, vineyards were soaked with an astounding 370 mm (14.5 inches) of rainfall in the month of July, making it impossible to work in the vineyards with any type of machinery and slowing the ripening process as vine disease was left unchecked.

Barbaresco, in the northwest, is an exception in an otherwise bleak outlook this year for the country’s wine trade.

"It could be Barbaresco's year," Berry Brothers & Rudd Italian buyer David Berry Green said yesterday. "They suffered less rain [100 mm compared to 260 mm in Barolo] and no hail."

Aldo Vacca, export manager for the cooperative Produttori del Barbaresco, said that unless the weather took a "disastrous" turn, "it looks like we'll be able to make our single-vineyard wines". He said that he expected a vintage similar to 2005 with "excellent but medium-bodied, bright wines".

In Barolo, where most growers will conclude harvest over the next few days, estates unaffected by June hailstorms are pleased with good potential alcohol levels in their Nebbiolo.