We received an unexpected inch and a half of rain on June 28, but after that little aberration, it’s generally been seasonal Sierra Foothills weather:  sunny, cloudless skies, hot days, and cool nights.  We’ve had two runs into the upper 90’s, including about a week in early July, but have avoided triple digit days to date.  Our vines started showing some water stress beginning in early-mid July, and we have been irrigating regularly since.  The berry growth seemed exceptionally fast this year, going from bloom to obvious fruit clusters in about 3 weeks.  Primary shoot growth is all but done now as the vines concentrate their energy on fruit development.

In the barbera, we waited until mid-late July to remove the “kicker canes”–a single intact cane left at pruning to absorb some of the vigorous vegetative growth of barbera.  This year, the April frost damage resulted in light fruit set on most barbera vines, so we actually used the kicker canes to augment fruit production and hopefully bring the vines into better balance than would otherwise have been possible.  Thus, the kicker canes were generally removed only in part, to a degree decided on a plant-by-plant basis,  so that the fruit that they carried could add to the total for the vine. 

Shoot growth in the primitivo was exceptional–that is to say long–this year, probably helped by the late rain.  This is not a particular problem unless driving a tractor between rows, which can be a punishing experience with primitivo’s stiff shoots.  Shoot thinning there is well underway and should be completed soon.  Shoot thinning in the port vineyard and “new” touriga field was completed by early July.

Weeds loved the late rain and have had to be mowed and re-mowed for us to gain any semblance of control.  In or near the vine rows, our old friend (not) horsetail remains weed enemy #1.  Though easy to pull out, it is remarkably prolific and obviously refractory to our preemergent weed treatment.  On the bright side of pest control, we have gotten extremely handy with two kinds of gopher traps after nearly giving up on these contraptions.  In the last 3 weeks, we have sent 8 or 9 gophers to the great gopher hole in the sky, but not before they had a field day tunnelling in and around our orchard and vineyard.

On the county fair circuit (home winemaker division), we are pleased to report that our port-style wine Dorado (2008) won a double gold at the 2011 Orange County Fair and a silver medal at the 2011 Amador County Fair.  Our 2009 primitivo won a silver at the 2011 Amador County Fair (not entered elsewhere).

Five “shares” of our mixed port varietals as well as some primitivo and barbera remain available for sale for the 2011 season.

The growing season is now in full swing.  This would normally be a rather unnecessary statement approaching the summer solstice, but it has been an unusual spring…again!  As northern California residents are well aware, it’s been a persistently cool and relatively wet spring, significantly delaying most crops.  The last rain–still an abundant one–came on June 6.  After June 6, Mother Nature offered up some dry but still unseasonably cool springtime weather which was perfect for getting work done, though did not nothing to make up for the late budburst.  In the last few and coming few days, finally, we’re seeing some typical Foothills summer weather, with some hot days and cool nights.  We are seeing “bloom” (flowering) in all of our main varietals right now.  The net effect of all of this is that the 2011 vintage is likely to play out similar to last year–with late ripening across the board–and we have set our harvest expectations accordingly.

The frost that hit our barbera turned what is normally tedious shoot-thinning into an absolute slog.  Frost-affected plants typically push buds that even they didn’t know they had, and this compounded the propensity of barbera to push unwanted shoots.  But the work is done, and the good news is that the expected suppressive effect of frost on crop load has left a crop that is both adequate to meet current demand and clearly NOT in need of subsequent fruit-dropping, an operation that normally occurs in the hottest time of the year.  The vines were so nicely thinned that we were able to count fruit clusters in a large sample of the barbera vineyard, and concluded that, assuming normal attrition and cluster size, we should only come up one ton shy of target, leaving some barbera still for sale.  The vines look great now, and we’ll now focus on keeping the vines healthy for what should be some nice, concentrated fruit.

The primitivo appears to have been completely spared the early spring frosts, and the shoots are still in a rapid growth phase, with bloom fully in progress and vines looking extremely good.  Shoot thinning in the primitivo (and neighboring touriga) will commence after the impending heat wave passes.  In the last month, we completed a mundane (to the client) but extremely helpful re-jiggering of our irrigation blocks in the primitivo.  Block 6 had been added onto from the original planting in 2002, making it a little too large as a watering block for our well pump.  A portion of the block had subsequently been grafted over to touriga nacional, meaning that the two varietals were being irrigated at the same rate.  We’ve now reduced the size of Block 6 by breaking off the “new” touriga as its own watering block.  This will allow us to more effectively reach all the primitivo in Block 6 with water and customize the irrigation of the touriga.

The Quinta–our circa half-acre of Portugese varietals–is well-positioned for a great season.  It appeared that the touriga nacional portion of this vineyard was partially affected by the spring frosts, but this was mild enough, and the vines resilient enough, that crop load looks normal. The tinto cao, on other hand, was hit harder, and shoot thinning with that varietal and adjoining tempranillo was focused on preserving fruitful clusters.  We think the net effect of the frost has been to limit crop load very close to our targets from an unusually early period of the season, which we would anticipate would only help concentration.  This, together with our previously mentioned removal of a partially shading tree to the south of this vineyard have us very optimistic for this vintage.  The Quinta’s 2011 production of about 1.25 tons, which represents a turnkey opportunity for making a port-style wine with all the complexity of an authentic Portugese-style port (or an equally complex Portugese-style dry red wine), is still available for purchase.  Absent a single buyer for these grapes, we will be making available “shares” of this vineyard to give smaller scale winemakers a chance to make such a wine. 

We received more great news on the 2011 wine competition front, this time from our some wines made commercially with Shaker Ridge grapes.  Oakstone Winery of Fair Play’s 2008 primitivo took a gold medal at the Amador County Fair and a bronze medal at the California State Fair.  Oakstone’s 2009 barbera–recently released by that winery after sell-through of the 2008–garnered silver medals at the El Dorado County Fair, the Amador County Fair, and the California State Fair.  And the first-ever commercial touriga made with our Quinta grapes, produced by Obscurity Cellars of Fair Play, earned a gold medal at the California State Fair and silver medals at both the El Dorado and Amador county fairs.  Congratulations to Oakstone and Obscurity on these outstanding results.

We’ve enjoyed a little of everything so far in May, with summer-like heat giving way to perfect, low 70’s, springtime-like weather, followed by relatively rare May rain, more hail storms, and overnight temperatures in the low 40’s.  As expected, the vines exploded out of the gates in late April, and the cover crops between rows shot right up with them, the latter needing to be mowed early so that we could even move around out there. 

As predicted, we suffered some frost damage to our early-pushing tinto cao from a pair of early April frosts; the surprise was that our barbera got hit to some extent as well.  Apparently the buds–which were on the verge of pushing but had not yet pushed when the frosts hit–were sensitive enough to be affected.  The damage was random and, as the recent vineyard gallery pictures will attest, have hardly stopped the vines.  Indeed, it is rather hard to kill a grapevine; the main impact of mild frost like we experienced is to kill off some of the fruitful buds intentionally left behind from pruning, and lead to germination of less fruitful secondary buds, which we find that barbera push in abundance in a normal year.  The net impact of the frost is to decrease yield, though the magnitude of the impact will not be clear until we set select shoots and set fruit in a few weeks.  We expect that our committed barbera is quite safe at this point, but we may need to lower the estimate of barbera still available for sale. 

In the primitivo vineyard, we are experimenting with some nutritional supplementation in alternate rows derived from our cover crop.  In addition, we will be punching extra irrigation emitters in the rockier portion of the vineyard that dries out first in the summer heat.  Adjacent to both the primitivo and Portugese varietal vineyards, we’ve removed some trees that mainly provided easy cover for marauding birds and squirrels, which we think can only help our cause.

We received some fantastic news from the first of the regional home winemaker competitions, the El Dorado County Fair (our home county).  Our three entrants–a 2009 touriga nacional varietal wine, a 2008 dry red blend of our Portugese varietal grapes, and a 2008 dessert wine we call “Dorado” made from our Portugese varietal grapes in a vintage port style, all won gold medals.  We are particularly pleased to report that the Dorado won “Best of Show” in the El Dorado County Fair home winemaker competition, our first wine with this distinction.  All of these wines were made from our estate grapes. 

We have been “pounding the table” (in Wall Street speak) on the Portugese varietals for a couple of years now, and we hope that the strong showing of the wines made from these grapes will encourage more takers for our “Quinta” grapes.  As noted elsewhere on our website, if we are unable to sell the Quinta grapes to a single producer by July 1, we will be offering 10% shares in this year’s production to give smaller producers a chance to play with them.  Separately, we have varietal touriga for sale and suspect that you will enjoy its qualities as much as we do.

It has been a busy few weeks as we prepare for budburst of the grapevines and the between-row mowing and mildew-preventative spraying that will ensue.   The string of March rains/hail storms finally relented, and beautiful spring  to early summer-like days (albeit a bit chilly some mornings) followed, starting to bring the vines to life.  We rapidly completed “winter pruning” of our primitivo and port vineyards in advance of budburst.  In total, we logged over 120 hours over several weeks pruning our ~7 acres of grapes, which represents only the first of several times that each vine will be touched throughout the season. 

Budburst was observed in our earliest pushing varieties (tinto cao in our “port” vineyard; muscat blanc which we use for eating/juice) on April 6, only to be greeted with light frost on the mornings of April 8 and 9.  The extent of damage, if any, to these varietals is not yet clear, but cooler temperatures and a little April rain/clouds have nevertheless reined in early growth.  Fortunately, our earliest pushing main varietal, barbera, had not pushed as of April 8/9 and indeed has not pushed as of this writing (April 15), though bud swell is evident, and budburst seems imminent.  A couple of pictures showing the deceptive “calm before the storm” of our dormant 9-year-old barbera vines (10th “leaf”) just before budburst are posted as part of our “vineyard gallery”.

All in all, we’re looking at a later-than-average start to the growing season, but we’re in good shape with adequate winter rains and  time to complete the necessary pre-season activities.  We look forward with optimism to the coming growing season and fair wine competitions.

“La Nina” years are supposed to be lean on rain, and the specific forecast for our wet season this year was early winter rain, followed by relatively dry weather.  And this looked brilliant for awhile there, with notably heavy rain in late December/early January yielding to several weeks on end of sunny skies and warming temperatures in January and early February.  But cool, wet rains have been very persistent since late February, with more rain forecast in the days ahead, promising yet another relatively late bud burst and compact spring season. 

The vineyard is like a tightly coiled spring right now.  While not a single bud has pushed and there are only minimal indications of bud swelling, the ground is completely saturated with water, the days are getting palpably longer, and the temperatures are slowly creeping up.  One senses that the vines–not to mention the cover crops and weeds–can’t wait to start their explosive early season growth–but consistent cool rains and limited sunshine have kept them all in check.  As usual, the extension of the “off season” is welcome to some degree since there is always more to do than time to do it, but at some point, the lateness is not welcome, as it makes for a more hectic early season and pushes other vineyard activities into a time of unbearable heat.   Right now, with our barbera vineyard completely pruned and pruning begun on the other varietals, all is orderly and serene.  But, we know too well that it is the calm before the storm.

The vineyard is completely dormant as of early March, but the cool weather is slowly losing its grip, and the buds will soon begin to swell.  Some false spring weather some weeks back fooled some of our fruit trees into flowering, but fortunately the vines did not bite on the fake, as a series of frosty days ensued.   We are busily working on off-season projects including some work to more evenly distribute our irrigation blocks and improve tractor turnaround room.  The biggest job–now more than half-complete–is the winter pruning of the vines, a very satisfying but labor-intensive endeavor.

The most important change in the off-season is that co-proprietor Andy is on the farm fulltime now and will be personally providing a much greater fraction of the farm labor.  We anticipate that this will allow the individual attention to vines required for achieving optimal vine balance.  Hired labor is expedient and necessary at times, but it’s very hard to communicate instructions that are practical enough to be implemented by a hired crew that take into account an individual vine’s needs.  

We think our experiment with the inclusion of “kicker canes” was successful last year in our barbera as a means of reigning in vigor, though they certainly add to the labor at multiple steps.  We are using kicker canes again this year in the barbera, but this time have taken pains for a more optimal placement of these to be more readily removed later.

We look forward to a great year–maybe closer to the mean in terms of timing–and hope for some strong showings for wines made from our grapes in regional competitions.  Prices and availability for the 2011 growing season are now posted.

We want to thank our clients for a successful conclusion to the unique 2010 growing season.  The grapes eventually all ripened, and we were able to find homes for all but a few specimens which got taken out by the fall rains.  We enjoyed seeing a lot of familiar faces again as well as meeting some new people:  in 2010, we provided grapes for a total of 3 commercial wineries and 8 home winemakers.  We sincerely hope that we’ve provided the raw material for some stellar wines that will show well in competitions and, more importantly, in the glass.  A special thanks to those who brought us samples of your past efforts with Shaker Ridge grapes:  we always enjoy these, and have been blown away by some very impressive wines. 

As usual, we will take the down time afforded by the off-season to recuperate from the season’s toils as well as re-think our operations and see what might do differently or better.  We tentatively plan to post 2011 pricing and begin taking orders for next season in January, 2011.

The harvest season is winding down, though some very good (and ripe) fruit remains hanging.  The days are getting progressively shorter, and some rain is in the forecast, so the long-awaited “off season” period of rest can’t be far off.

Still available for dry style wines are barbera and touriga.  The barbera is pickable now, but with green plants and some sunshine still in the forecast, may also benefit from additional hangtime to lower the acidity.  The fruit is at a about 27 brix now, so not as high as this one has can get in this area and in our experience.  The touriga is also pickable but appears to need a little more hang time to get the brix up; it’s currently at a little over 23 brix.

On the late harvest (dessert wine) side, there are some excellent possibilities.  Tinto cao, a thick-skinned classical port grape, has attained a degree of ripeness that we have never seen previously in our vineyard; it’s at 28 brix, and with respectable acid.  Visually, the small tinto cao berries (which come in loose clusters) seem to have achieved high sugar levels with a minimum of dehydration.  The touriga nacional, a mainstay of traditional port-style wines, has 26 plus brix and is fully ripe, though with some raisining.  It is past optimal time for a dry wine, and should be picked soon for best results on the dessert wine side.  Finally, some delicious primitivo fruit remains a possibility for late harvest wines; the fruit is in very good shape and is sporting sugars in the 28+ brix range.

The heat returned with a vengeance this week, driving temperatures into the triple digits for a couple of days and otherwise being reminiscent of mid-summer in the Foothills.  The heat caused some incremental ripening, but also inevitable dehydration, inflating both brix and TA.

We have met all of our commitments for primitivo and–crop estimation being a fine art that we’re still learning–have about 0.75 tons still remaining in the field.  Given that we committed a little over 5 tons, this suggests that we were right on target for yield at about 2 tons/acre.  The grapes are still usable for dry wine given a healthy TA level, but time is short due to the recent spike in sugar.  After this weekend (Oct. 2-3), the remaining fruit would be most suitable for dessert wine applications, e.g. late harvest or port-style.  Our 2008 homemade wine produced with primitivo from this field won a gold medal, Best of Class at the 2010 Amador County Fair.

The barbera is coming along steadily, and though we have suffered some inevitable attrition from dehydration, there is still plenty of good, plump fruit available for harvest.  Over the past 6 weeks, we have gone back through a second time and dropped some main crop and most seconds from all of Block 4 and select sections of the rest of the barbera vineyard.  Due to time constraints, we have only been sampling Block 4 until now, but will begin wider sampling soon.  We expect that–depending on the irrigation block and client preference/schedules–this fruit will be ready for picking in 1 to 3 weeks.  We hope that the long hang time has been beneficial for flavor development, and we will continue to irrigate proactively to try to keep the brix in check.  Moderating temperatures forecast for the coming week are good news for nice ripening of this fruit.

As we had no takers for the Quinta (thanks for saving it for us!), we will be harvesting this wonderful fruit over the next several weeks and posting any leftovers for sale on this website.  This fruit will be available only in home winemaker-type quantities (hundreds of pounds) and will be picked at a ripeness suitable for dessert wine.

Separate from the Quinta fruit, we have about a ton of touriga from vines that we grafted over from another varietal last year.  This fruit was not cropped as sparingly as the Quinta touriga and so is a couple weeks behind in ripeness, but is coming along nicely and available at a discount relative to the touriga nacional in our Quinta.  It makes a dark, fragrant wine, and is suitable for dry and (at higher ripeness) dessert wine applications.

Please see our latest grape chemistry posting on this blog for recent chemistry sampling information for all of the above grapes.