Hello and Welcome,
Well, it seems like
Déjà vu all over again. Another cool wet spring followed by a delayed summer
resulting in a great appreciation for sunny days ahead!
Just to be on the
safe side though, we went ahead and starting farming the vineyard anyway. The
Spring cover crop of Buckwheat and Vetch is moving along nicely. This will be
the fertilizer for the vines when we 'till it back into the soil in late
September. This is how we avoid using chemical fertilizers in the vineyard - we
grow our own nutrients and fix nitrogen right out of thin air!
We are also keeping
the permanent grass cover between the rows mowed down. It is kind of a Brazilian
wax for the vineyard. The goal here is to generate a little more heat from the
vineyard floor, like from Brazil, by keeping the vegetation short. This also may
contribute to opening the harvest window a day or so early.
In an attempt to
help focus the vines in this cool Spring, we have removed all of the
waterspouts, aka "suckers," from the base of the vines. Every year these vines
grow suckers as an act of self preservation. If the top of the vine were to be
destroyed somehow, perhaps by a kinetic chainsaw insurgence, the suckers would
carry on and the vine would survive.
We use the suckers
as a tool to manage the vines' vigor, or growth habit. In the Spring, the vine
is naturally in quite a hurry to develop a full canopy that will support the
ripening of fruit. In a warm year, we divert some of this energy to the suckers
to slow things down. But not this year, we want that energy into the canopy with
NFD* to see if we can advance the harvest window.
The first set of
catch wires are up and clipped into place. This is where the canopy management
battle for Pinot Noir is won or lost. All of these shoots are positioned and
tucked by hand. This year we have about 41,779 fruiting vines, with about 14
shoots apiece. Yeah, it is quite a multiplier. We follow this process through
with 2 more sets of wires and then we bring out the hedger.
Hedging is most
likely the best tool we can use to advance ripening. As the vines grow, each
shoot tip is looking for the optimal place to ripen fruit. The shoot will
continue to grow, and delay ripening fruit, until one of two things happen.
First, the vine could run out of soil moisture. Not likely this spring after the
cool wet weather we have had.
Second, we may
employ a kinetic activity that separates the shoot tip from the shoot - hedging.
Believe it or not, this does not require an act of Congress. Once the shoot tip
is removed several things happen in the vine. The first is that the "lateral"
buds along the shoot all start to push and produce their own shoots. This is
good in that these laterals will create more leaves that will provide energy for
the vine.
This is bad in that
we have now encouraged about 15 times as many new shoot tips as we had before.
We let these laterals grow until they extend beyond the canopy "safe" zone. Then
Ernie runs the hedger back through to perform a second kinetic activity. By this
time the vine is starting to get the message - "NO NEW SHOOTS." This is how we
encourage the vines to focus their limited energy on ripening fruit and
hopefully advance the harvest window, which is our theme for today.
Have you noticed
that there is very little talk of "hang time" these days? Hang time is those
extra few days that help develop flavors and aromas in the skins, and we all
want that to a point. However, the talk these days is avoiding diluted or rotted
fruit and excessive bird damage. As humans we seem to seek the avoidance of pain
over the desire for pleasure. Finally, a point about harvest - it's not that
hard. We know where the grapes are. We just have to go get them.
And now a little
something for the number crunchers.
The month of
June logged about 270 degree days providing a total of 308 degree days since the
beginning of the growing season on April 1st. This compares with 249
degree days last June and a comparative total of 334 degree days. During June,
our highest high was 85.1 and our lowest high was 83.7. Our lowest low was 40.2
and our highest low was 42.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
The
rainfall for June was 0.66 inches and was about 4.31 inches less than last
June's rain of 4.97. Rainfall since April 1st through June
30th was 5.62 inches, and is 7.31 inches less than last year's Q2
accumulation of 12.93 inches. Every inch of rain is about 27,000 gallons of
water per acre, or about 18.6 gallons per vine. The average monthly humidity was
70.11% and the average dew point was 48.95
degrees.
Clearly a cool
start to the year, but with a warmer and dryer June than last year. The
implication is that our soil moisture is a little more depleted than last year
and this may begin flavor development a bit early due to water stress. Or, it
could just start to rain with NFD in mid-September and we would be done with the
whole damn affair.
Until next month,
think sunny warm thoughts...
Ernie
* NFD -
Technical farming term "No Further Delay."
