Vineyard Walkthru

We did our vineyard walk through today. The three winemakers who are going to make the Syrah decided how they will divide up the harvest. There was lots of concern over not getting ripe enough. The Syrah is at about 15 brix sugar. It needs to be at least 22. That’s 7 to go, and it usually takes about 1 week per 1 Brix. So we are out 7 weeks, assuming good weather, which is shaky at this point.

They talked about foliar sprays that boost sugar; they decided not to. The wines these guys sell are >$50/bottle. They need the flavors to be right. If the sugars and resultant alcohol are a little low, but the flavor is right, thay are happy. No one knew what would happen to flavors using these foliar sprays.

They were unhappy with the few green berries that are left. The problem is that the green berries will turn purple, but will never ripen. And when the berries are on the sorting table (yes, these guys sort individual berries before crushing), you can’t find the unripe ones and into the wine they go. So they would rather have a crew go through the vineyard and remove the green berries while they can see them. That is a slow process, and will cost the grower some bucks.

We are looking at the end of October at this point for the Syrah. The Pinot however will probably be ready in 2 weeks.

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