Hello and Welcome,
This is the “Late Harvest” Climate
Update for October 2013.
Well, Typhoon Pabuk came and
went. That kinda put a damper on the harvest operations for most folks.
Something about 9 inches of rain in a 4 day window reminds Ernie of what his
father used to say about packing 10 pounds of grit in a 5 pound bag. We
certainly were over received. Oddly, no one knew it was coming. And this was
before the self inflicted government shutdown. At least OUR website was still up
and running.
Once the ocean stopped falling
out of the sky at a 45 degree down angle, it was cool and drizzly for a few
days. The soil and permanent grassed rows did their work of soaking up the
rains and recharging the dry soil profile. But they can only absorb so much so
fast. The rest was run off. That is the sad truth about farming on hillsides
and why Ernie is so keen to keep a rotational cover crop in the recycle rows.
It takes a long time to build an inch of topsoil.
But, the cool weather during this
time was quite helpful. As astute readers of this communication know, Botrytis
is our nemesis as we cruise through the harvest window. Botrytis needs 2 things
to take over your vineyard – warm temperatures and airborne moisture, also
known as rain. The cool temperatures are what kept the fungus from taking us
out. That and our elevated vineyard position allowed us to rise above all of
the humidity that pooled at the lower elevations in our growing area. Success
leaves clues.
Since we had a little time on our
hands, we thought we would look a little more closely into this Noble Rot
fungus. A more technical name is Botrytis Cinerea. But that is hard and
somewhat awkward to work into a conversation around the end post, hence the
shortening to just Botrytis. To be more accurate and specific we should be
saying Botryotinia Fuckeliana*.
Botryotinia Fuckeliana is the
causal (some may say casual) agent of gray mold disease, better known as
Botrytis Cinerea. What this means is actually very simple. Botryotinia Fuckeliana
is a fungus that reproduces sexually, while Botrytis Cinerea is a form of the
fungus that reproduces asexually. Either way, once they get started watch out.
It does not take long to turn ripe, healthy mature fruit into a mycological
nightmare. Or does it?
A surprising thing happened on our
way to Halloween this year, a very unique and unprecedented thing to be sure.
Even more special than that 2007 vintage! It stopped raining, the sun
reappeared, the breeze picked up and it remained mild during the day and cool
at night. It was about the 5th of the month when we got this “go”
sign directly from Ma herself to start harvest. And we did!
We also rely on the tried and
true Walnut tree. Every year we sample the vineyard, check the sugars and acids
and taste the fruit. We develop a detailed “Harvest Package” day by day to
schedule the blocks we want to harvest and in what order. The birds certainly
have some input into these harvest logistics. But all we really need to do is
watch this majestic Walnut tree. Every year the fruit hangs until we see this
magnificent torch appear.
We were picking Pinot Meunier and
Pinot Noir just about as fast as the birds were. Bear in mind they are uniquely
suited to this activity much more so than humans, opposable thumbs or not.
Having experienced 2010, where about 300 cases of wine flew away, Ernie decided
to get out the nets. Oddly enough, birds and fish share a common failing when
it comes to understanding nets. Yeah, that slowed ‘em down and kept a little
more fruit on the vine so that we could hang it to optimal ripening. Optimal,
of course, is a relative term, but it is vintage specific.
About the 9th of October we decided
we better have a look at the Chardonnay. Sure as grit, there was a fair farmin’
bit of Botryotinia Fuckeliana going down. Ernie likes to see a little bit of
this activity before harvest, but this was something other. So we plucked the
clusters we could, declared victory and got back to the Pinot Noir. By then Peaches
had returned, with friends.
We had 4 very nice looking does
join us one morning for harvest. The new deer fence is quite effective indeed,
as they could not get out. From their point of view, why would they? There were
several clones of Pinot Noir to choose from and even a few new shoot tips here
and there. Life was good, good, good.
And not so good for the robin who
was ensnared in one of the nets. Not his lucky day as he attracted the
attention of Geoffrey Chambertin, our resident Redtail hawk. You win some, you
lose some and some get Botryotinia Fuckeliana.
As we wrapped up the
Pinot Noir cluster pluck, (which was just farmin’ great, mind you) we had
Chardonnay on our minds. Ernie took a walk to revisit the carnage. Yeah, they
were brown, and yeah, they were shriveling on the vine, but they were sweet and
surprisingly, they did NOT taste like mold. Well now, what the Botryotinia Fuckeliana
do we have here?
What we have here is Noble Rot,
plain and simple. It is a very rare year in the Willamette Valley
One of the most fundamental
things in farming is to know what you can fix, what you need to replace and how
to tell the difference. Ernie did not know how to deal with this noble gift, so
he did what Ernie does. He called Dick Erath.
Dick made it down to the farm
late in October. They took a tour of the Chardonnay and decided it was not such
a sad little tree after all (sorry, wrong movie.) A quick snip with Dick’s
knife and in no time they had plucked a few clusters. Back in the lab Ernie
squeezed those little berries until they gave up their secrets. Here is what
they said “37.4 Brix at 3.42 pH and our seeds are brown. That is all we know.
Well, that and it is going to rain eventually.”
That was enough. Dick shared a
late harvest wine he had made from another greatly misunderstood vintage –
1997. He said it was the kind of wine you could apply topically, and remove
orally. That was a point not lost on Ernie as he had Botryotinia Fuckeliana on
his mind. With Dick’s help, Ernie got to thinking about how to turn those
grapes from block 24 into sweet nectar. We commenced our Late Harvest BFC run on
October 28th. Stay tuned for scenes from our next episode.
Why yes, we make Rhône wines! The
Viognier from 2013 is an aromatic wonderland of homemade peach jam, white
apricots, cinnamon and tamarind. We may even bottle some if Ernie doesn’t
sample it all first. Estimated production is 5.5 cases, down from the 16 cases
produced and bottled from 2012. Maybe this sequester thing is getting a little
out of hand.
The Syrah came rolling in on
October 31st. We hang it until it looks like we are going into a severe
rain pattern. It can use all the hang time it can get. The light fruit set also
affected this variety with an estimated production of just 2 barrels, or about
50 cases. Yeah, that’s farmin’.
If you have not had a chance to
experience harvest, please take a moment to watch harvest at Amalie
Robert Estate. The video was filmed and produced by VineStories.
After watching an Amalie Robert Estate wine grape harvest, you may also enjoy
learning more about the Spaghetti
Harvest with this video.
Back by popular demand, the
numbers. After the emotionally cleansing rains of September, we had a pretty
nice October. From a harvest operations point of view, it was nice and we liked
it! From a fruit point of view, we saw our first blocks of Pinot Noir come in
around 21.0 Brix and our last blocks, the really good stuff, was taken around
the 15th at around 24.0 Brix. Clearly the vines knew when to stop
taking up water and get on with ripening their seeds. Curious little plants
indeed.
For the first 15 days of October,
we accumulated 6.8 Degree Days, for a growing season to date total of 2,143.1
Degree Days. Our high temperature was 77.0 and our low temperature was 34.2
degrees Fahrenheit. That cool weather really saved our acids! We accumulated 1.13
inches of rainfall through October 15th. Rainfall since April 1st
is 22.50 inches.
Here is how we looked at
mid-October in 2012:
The first half of Octo-Vember
gave us 144 Degree Days. Our high temperature was a blistering 92.5 degrees and
our low temperature was just above the frost level at 37.60. Rainfall for this
15 day period was 2.13 inches. Total 2012 growing season Degree Days represent
a perfect cool climate vintage at 2,068 and rainfall checks in at 11.09 inches.
¡Salud!
“The Premier Oregon Pinot Noir Auction” is being held November 8th
and 9th and we will be showcasing the outstanding 2012 vintage. It’s
not too late to purchase tickets to attend the ¡Salud! Pinot Noir auction this year. Please follow this link to
learn more: www.saludauction.org
If you can not attend, but would
like to enter a sealed bid, there is still time. For more information, please
follow this link for more information about placing a sealed bid: http://www.saludauction.org/auction/the-oregon-pinot-noir-auction/auction-items/.
You may also contact Lindsay Coon
at ¡Salud! by phone at 503-681-1850
or by e-mail at lindsay.coon@tuality.org.
Kindest Regards,
Dena & Ernie
* Botryotinia
fuckeliana was named by mycologist Heinrich Anton de Bary in honor of
another mycologist, Karl Wilhelm Gottlieb Leopold Fuckel.
