Notes From The Winemaker

Estate Vineyard Planning 2006

We have had a string of clear days in the 70's here, making me think about the vines coming out of dormancy. This would be -- hmmmmm, let's see -- the THIRD of FOURTH year in a row where warm weather in February wakes the vines up early. This is not necessarily a problem in itself, except when an early budbreak is followed by a long stretch of wet and/or cold weather. As it has been for years now. In 2005 late-April frosts and rains during bloom in late June devastated the Pinot crop. Quality of what we harvested was high, but the costs of production weren't even close to being covered by the yield.

It did not help that our frost control was ineffective in 2005. Wind machines do no good at our site, where cold air does not pool below warm but rather settles in a never-ending stream off the hillsides above our vineyard. Last year I had sourced a low-volume water spray system, but that got nixed when the supplier got caught up in a patent dispute. Today I am looking at a quote on a new system that uses more water, but still less than a standard spray head. We'll see. In the meantime I'm praying for a warm Spring.

Following the short 2005 Pinot crop, I'm about 100% sure that at least two of the winery-operated vineyards I have been buying Pinot from (Castle and Nicholson Ranch) are not going to sell to me in 2006. Call it the "Sideways Effect" perhaps, but there is a general feeling in the industry that Pinot Noir sales are taking off like Merlot did in the 90's. Frankly I think it is a lot of marketing people engaging in wishful thinking. Whatever; going forward I'm not going to have enough great Pinot to meet my modest production targets.

Barring another set of weather like 2005, the Estate Vineyard should fill in most of the shortfall from the two vineyards I'm going to lose. So far (after ONE crop year -- ha!) it looks to me like the Estate is capable of producing fruit at least as distinctive as what I am losing. I'm just going to need more.

For the past couple of days I have been working on sourcing vines to plant this Summer. I already have a couple acres each of Dijon clones 115 and 667 on 101-14 rootstock on the Estate. I'm hoping to add at least an acre each of clones 777 and 943 on a Riparia-like stock this year.

Next year I'm thinking that I will bud over about half of my 667 vines to clone 114 based on results I have obtained from the fruit I have been buying off the Castle Carneros plot, where the clone 114 produces the lovliest of wines. Clone 114 Pinot is mercurial -- when it is good it is very, very good. At some sites I have seen it is not so good. I think its performance is related to crop loading, and as I tend to balance my Pinot at the low end of reasonable the 114 should do well at the Estate.

posted 2/08/2006 01:26:00 PM