Organic horticulture in the Willunga plains has changed radically in the last few decades. Under pressure from government policy to encourage water efficiency measures, grapes have largely replaced the water hungry almonds.

Water use and sustainability issues remain prominent and controversial in the Willunga area, and nearby McLaren Vale grape growing region. Although grapes produce a greater return to the grower per hectare of land and per megalitre of water, questions remain about the desirable diversity of agricultural production, tourism potential, land use conflicts around chemical inputs and overall sustainability of viticulture. Stonefruit has almost completely disappeared from the district, the last cropping land is under severe pressure from housing projects, and consequently the last few dairies that relied on this land for reserve fodder are also threatened. 

Revegetation of the long-bared Willunga escarpment is also a factor that intersects with water catchment and quality, and reforestation of this prominent landform is an encouraging feature of recent changes.
Regardless of the controversies, the relentless spread of vines across the region continues, driven by water policy and the pressing need to improve financial returns from agriculture. Two interesting issues are inescapable in any observation of these changes. The first is the strong tendency for the organic growers to maintain some of their production diversity, or even to increase it. For instance Adrian Strachan's property grows almonds, vines and olives, with extensive planting of multi-row, multi-species, multi-height native windbreaks, whereas many non-organic growers have pulled all the orchards and almonds, for which Willunga was once famous. Almonds now produce a much less subdued blanket of white blossom to brighten the district in late winter.

Another feature of the changed land use is the herbicide strip under new vines. Even the organic growers generally withdraw from certification for a few years after planting, to establish the new vines well, before returning to organic certification.

John and his wife Catherine have retained their certification for 4 hectares of almonds, on a 8.4 hectare property at the foot-slope of the Willunga scarp. The first of the vines were planted in 1998, and the grape area was removed from certification. A further patch was planted in 2001, requiring a small patch of almonds to be removed.