Author Archives: Doug Williams

Frozen Pipes – Update

If you remember, right before we went on vacation in December, we had a very cold week (by Sebastopol standards) and our pvc pipes to the vineyard froze and broke. I repaired the broken pipe yesterday and turned on the water to the system to test it. Low and behold, the pressure gauge broke and a 1″ brass valve cracked and was leaking. I can almost understand the pressure gauge, but a solid brass valve, wow! And it was only in the mid-20’s.

I learned my lesson…I have to winterize the pipes this fall.

Replacement Vines – Gophers are only funny in Caddy Shack!

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OK, so if you have watched Caddy Shack you probably think gophers are cute and harmless. Well, here in West Sonoma County we would do anything to get rid of the little guys! They eat the roots of the grapevines. Let’s do a little math….it takes around 4 years until the vine is in full production. Eat vine I have makes about 1 bottle of wine…so if a gopher eats a full grown vine I lose about $100 of gross wine sales. Now they are not so cute. Last week I had to replace 93 vines….some from gophers and some that never grew well.

I have to hand water the vines until we start irrigating the entire vineyard in 2 months, a lot of work.

I had 7 vines left over that I planted in a nursery row.

Trading a Mercedes for a John Deere

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As some of you know, November 2012 we were in an car accident. It was not our fault, but my faithful 1997 C230 was totaled. I went back and forth on what to get…but eventually decided that the F250 was my vehicle.

Well, I just got a new vehicle with that insurance money. A John Deere x304 Lawn Tractor!

If you read any of the posts back in 2010/2011 you will see that we planted the vineyard with very tight spacing…5′ x 40″ with only 12′ from the rows to the fence line. I didn’t test it well enough, so it has been very tight to drive around and also to use the current riding tractor.

So, why did I upgrade? Well, the current model was over 20 years old and I purchased it used from my neighbor at a garage sale when we moved to Sebastopol. Over the last 6 years I had to put in a lot of money to keep it going, so it was time. Why did I pick the John Deere? The biggest selling point is that is has 4 wheel steering! I hope you can tell in the picture that the back wheels turn also, so I can literally turn around a 20″ circle. On top of that is has a somewhat quieter engine, cruise control, hose clean out for the mulching bed, 4 year warranty, just to name a few of the options. Oh…and it is made in Wisconsin!!!

I’m hoping it will give me 20 years of good service at Turtle Vines.

Grape Buyers – Horse and Plow Winery

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Why do I have a picture of another winery in my blog post? Well, we sold 75% of our grapes to Horse and Plow Winery in 2013 and the rest went into our Turtle Vines Pinot Noir.

As a grape grower, I want them to be successful so the love and labor we put into the grapes show in their winemaking. I also want a great relationship with them as I hope it can turn into a long term partnership. They live 1 mile from our house here in Sebastopol. As a wine maker, this is the first year I can compare our winemaking style to an experienced and acclaimed winemaker. I can tell you from tasting a bottle of Gardener 2011 Pinot Noir Carneros that it was was wonderful. I hope the wine they made from our 2013 grapes is just as good. FYI…Gardener is a sister brand of Horse and Plow.

Here are their bio’s…

Chris is a California native, but only 3 generations from Greece. His Grandfathers made wine, his Dad sold wine, and Chris does both! Chris studied Plant Ecology at SF State and Viticulture and Enology at UC Davis, before beginning his career at Pine Ridge Winery. He started Vinum Cellars in Oakville in 1997, which currently produces 30,000 cases of wine. He has also been the consulting winemaker for Kathryn Kennedy Winery since 1998. Chris’s past experiences, hard work and talent as a winemaker are evident in every bottle of Horse & Plow.

Suzanne was born in Savannah, Georgia. Her interest in wine developed while working in fine restaurants in Charleston, South Carolina. The mystery and romance of food and wine led her to France, and her first harvest at Comte Armand in Pommard. She moved to California in 2000, working at DeLoach, David Bruce and Goldeneye wineries. Suzanne had a small, pinot noir brand called Lutea for seven years, before starting the Gardener with Horse & Plow. Suzanne takes a sensory approach to winemaking, and strives to capture the more esoteric aspects of time and place in each vintage.

Bud Break – Sauvignon Blanc…and plan for 2014

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Bud break for our Sauvignon Blanc happened , March 25, 2014. It is a week ahead of last year. If you remember, due to the location of the very small Sauvignon Blanc vineyard, it does not get as much sun as the Pinot Noir. Consequently we harvested these grapes 6 weeks after the Pinot Noir, at the end of October. This year I will try and alter the vines so that we will pick in mid-September. How you ask? Normally each shoot will produce 2 grape bunches. For the 29 vines near the house I will take off one of the bunches so the shoot will put all its energy into one bunch. By the way, some vineyards in Napa do this to their Cabnernet to enhance flavor. For the 5 new vines at the entrance of the Pinot vineyard, those get plenty of sun and I’ll leave 2 bunches. I’m hoping this will both hasten ripening and also produce better wine. I’m guessing we will get about 7 cases for 2014. Follow along…and check back in September to see if this experiment works!

Racking the 2013 Turtle Vines Pinot Noir

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Just a quick update on the 2013 Pinot Noir. Yesterday I spent the morning racking off the lees (dead yeast). Started with 73.5 gallons and after racking ended up with 71.5 gallons, enough for 30 cases. The only thing left to do before bottling in 6-9 months is sulfur to prevent spoilage, taste and make any small adjustments for acidity. How does it taste? Wonderful for its age! It has transitioned from fermented grape juice to young wine.

For those unfamiliar with the term, racking is the process of separating the liquid on the top from the solids on the bottom. You do this for several reasons; you want to end up with clear wine so you rack to get rid of the sediment, you need to get rid of the dead yeast because if you leave it to long it might give you a funky smell/taste. However, for Pinot Noir, you don’t want to rack it to much as this variety does not liked to be handled. Last year I racked the wine 3 times before bottling and this year I’m hoping that the day after pressing and this racking will be sufficient.

Winemaking Classes at Vinquiry !

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Vinquiry, a wine analysis lab, is holding a 5 part class, Craft Winemaking , over the next 5 months. I have signed up to add to my practical experience with technical, scientific supported data. It is designed for those in the industry who would like to know more about the entire process and winemakers to go from making good wine to great wine. I’m hoping to continue to add to my knowledge so each vintage my wine is better! At the end of the classes I’ll summarize the actions and implement them with my 2014 vintage.

Introduction to Winemaking – Overview of the process, concept of style, sanitation, equipment and winery choices, overview of analysis, SO2 management, sensory evaluation.

Maturation and ageing – Goals of aging, how to work with small lots, container choices, racking, protection wine during aging and movements, fining and treatments, potential problems and their prevention and treatment.

Finishing and Bottling – Stabilization, additions, clarification, filtration, blending, quality control, bottling and bottling equipment, packaging.

Grapes and Grape Processing – Sourcing grapes, vineyard sampling, picking decision, crushing (or not), crushing and pressing equipment, fermenters, temperature control, must and juice treatments/additions.

Fermentation – Yeast (or not), nutrition, fermentation management and monitoring, cap management, malolactic fermentation, problem fermentations, problem recognition and treatment.

Bottling the 2012 Pinot Noir

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What a day…March 11, 2014…we just bottled our 2012 Pinot Noir! We started with 96 gallons and filled 39 1/2 cases.

If you want to start from scratch and “Live the Dream”, plan on at least 5 years to grow the grapes, ferment them, let the red wine age until it is ready for a bottle…and another 3 months until bottle shock has worn off for you to drink it.

It was a great time with our 6 of our friends to bottle the wine. John (EMTU Vineyards) and I set everything up in 3 hours the day before…and then it took us another 3 hours to bottle and clean-up. The really great part is over 1/2 the crew was there when the grapes were harvested in 2012.

Here are the empty bottles.

Liz handled the bottling.

Joey and Enrique handle the corking.

John did the labeling.

Chris and Lauren put on the capsules, did a quality check and packaged them up.

Bill and I unloaded the bottles from the cases, moved the filled cases to the truck and of course sampled the product during the day to make sure it was OK to drink!

What you get from small wineries is a hand crafted product that is painstakingly farmed, carefully fermented and aged , and lovingly bottled. I hope those qualities come through when you taste the wine.

Bud Break – March 11, 2014

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Another growing season has begun, our 5th leaf at Turtle Vines! We had bud break March 11, 2014. This is 11 days later than 2013. Why? Our vines are older and we received a lot of rain 2 weeks ago, both contribute to a later start time. So…if the weather is the same as 2013, we will harvest the Pommard clone on September 22 and the 667 clone on September 31.

Australia and New Zealand Winery Tours

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Late December and early January we took a trip to Australia and New Zealand that was 25 years in the making. We flew from our home in Sebastopol to Sydney, Australia, picked up a cruise boat and headed down the coast of Australia to Tasmania, over to New Zealand and up to Auckland. Being from Wine Country…we had to take in the flavor of other areas of the wine making world.

One of our best stops was Hobart, in Tasmania. We happened to be there on the most exciting day of the year when these three things occurred:
The Taste of Tasmania – Tasmania’s largest food and wine festival.
A massive street fair.
The end of the Sidney Hobart yacht race.

We would have taken this entire trip just to be at the Taste of Tasmania. For $7 you get a little glass and can go around and taste all the wines at the fair. By the way, the crowd you see in the picture below is some of the 40,000 visitor that day to Hobart for the Yacht Race and Taste of Tasmania.

Our favorite wines were from Moorilla winery. We bought a bottle of their 2011 Pinot Noir and Sauvignon Blanc. We also liked the Kelvedon 2011 Pinot Noir. At this point we were trying to figure out how we were going to get all of these home since our suitcases were already stuffed to the gills.

The street fair, right outside the Taste of Tasmania, was just as busy. Booths lined the streets with food, clothes, pottery, and more. The best thing I had there were the fresh Tasmanian cherries – yummmm!

Because of bad weather, the start of the Sydney Hobart yacht race was delayed. Our cruise ship had to leave the port before the race ended and we thought we would miss this great event. But on our way out we passed the winning yacht! Our ship’s passengers waived wildly and our captain gave out a bit TOOT as we passed the winner, Wild Oats XI.
After having had one of the most fun days ever, we headed to New Zealand.

New Zealand Wine Country
As wine growers and wine makers, we were really looking forward to our trip to Picton where we took a tour of seven wineries in the famous region of Marlborough. We were surprised to find that most of their growing and wine making techniques were pretty much the same as what we do here in Sonoma county as we were hoping to pick up a few new tricks. But their wines were lovely and their vineyards were beautiful. I could have definitely spent more time in this amazing region.

We visited:
Lawson’s Dry Hills,
Wither Hill (loved their Pinot noir)
Hunter’s (run by Jane Hunter, a famous female wine maker)
Giesen Wines (had a lovely Riesling and a restaurant where we ate lunch)
Seresin Estate (a biodynamic vineyard that also sells the health promoting Manuka honey)
Spy Valley (had amazing views)
Drylands (who also sells Kim Crawford brand)

While in Auckland we jumped on a ferry to Waiheke Island. Unfortunately, all the tours were filled and, for the first time in almost a month, we had to rent a car and take our chances of driving on the other side of the road – yikes!

Waiheke Island is famous for its wineries but since we had to drive, we only stopped in a few places. Our first was a beautiful winery/restaurant called Casita Miro where I had the loveliest meal on the trip.

We drove to the other side of the island and visited Man O’ War, a vineyard on the water. It was the only tasting room where I’ve seen people pull up in their boats! It was laid back and people with their children came there to picnic, hang out and even teach their children how to play cricket.

Man O’ War got its name because it is on the part of the island where Captain Cook and his men came to get supplies and wood for the mast of war ships.

Amazing Experience
We were so lucky to be able to take a trip like this and meet the wonderful and friendly people in Australia and New Zealand. To experience the untouched and breathtaking coastal towns and see rare animals in their natural habitats was an indescribable experience. We loved the big cities like Sydney and Auckland and the tiny towns like Oban. One thing is for sure – we would LOVE to go back some day.

PS While not wine related, we got to experience the rarest of Penguins, the Yellow-Eyed, coming out of the ocean and feeding its chicks. Perhaps the best part of the entire trip!