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.
I have 3130 vines of very tightly space Pinot noir surrounded by houses and trees on a very slight grade. About 550 vines of the 667 clone were weaker than the other vines. They are near trees and on the top of the small grade. So last week I installed an extra drip line. I will water these vines earlier than the rest of the vineyard to allow them to grow better and catch up to the rest of the vines. It will also let me fertilize them through the irrigation system separately. You can do this type of customization with small vineyard and it will pay big dividends to ensure your vines are healthy producing high quality grapes!
Every year the vineyard has to be pruned. Old canes are removed, new ones are picked to allow for this years growth and then you have to chip the canes and spread them back into the vineyard. Why not just leave them in the vineyard? Well, even if they get mowed, the little pieces would get caught in the nets in the fall and cause a mess.
So, I removed the canes from the rows and made piles outside the rows. Then the canes are chipped and the mulch is put back on the rows to prevent weeds from growing. This year with about 1/2 the wires filled with canes it will take me 6 hours of chipping…a lot of hard work!
For those that don’t know it, we got in an accident 15 months ago…were T-Boned and my 15 year old C230 was totaled! We went back and forth whether to replace it with a Tesla/Audi/Mercedes/etc. or my favorite…a 2014 Honda Accord Hybrid which averages 50mpg both city and highway.
Eventually I decided I was a vineyard/winery person and now my regular car is my F250 XL (long bed with lift gate) I picked up used 3 years ago. So naturally I moved my license plate over…just took a while. So if you see a Big Red Truck in Wine Country with TRTLVNS for a license plate…honk.
The above picture was taken late February. It shows the status of the vineyard…the vines are pruned and tied, vines marked for removal or grafting with either green tape or a grow tube, extra water line installed (not pictured), clover is finally growing after a very dry winter but no wildflowers (rows marked with a flag had expensive wildflowers sewn in last fall). Still have work to do but this post will show the work in our 5th leaf for Turtle Vines and I will update it throughout the year.
Jan 28 Pruning 45 hrs (all hired)
Feb 17-21 Tie Canes 9
Feb 25 Cane chipping/2nd drip 14 (8 hired)
Total to date 68
Our Hawk is back! What does this have to do with our 2014 Vineyard Plan you ask…well, we want to be good stewards of the land by being organic yet grow the best tasting Pinot Noir possible.
2014 Improvement Activities:
1. Install a second irrigation line to 500 weak vines
2. Prune aggressively for 2014 to push root growth and conserve water intake due to the drought.
3. Water vines until “set”, or until the renewal spurs have grown appropriately.
4. Test petiole’s at bloom and make adjustments
5. Incorporate seaweed concentrate into foliar spraying plan to decrease shatter, increase berry size and grow healthier vines.
6. Vary powdery mildew/botrytis spray plan with Botector and Sulfur, in addition to Serenade, Stylet Oil and Soda.
7. Experiment with removing the basal leaves early in the season to avoid powdery mildew/botrytis.
8. Monitor TA and pH along with brix as harvest parameters.
9. Subcontract out bigger jobs if possible.
Last year I used a Tapener to tie the canes to the wires. Imagine doing this 10,000 times and using brown tape. This year my friend, John Mason at EMTU Estates, and I decided to purchase a Pellanc Tie tool and share the expense. Why share? You only have to tie once per year and the tool is expensive. The advantages of this tool are that it is at least 3x faster than by hand and you can use biodegradable twist ties. In addition you save yourself the exposure to carpal tunnel syndrome, which is prevalent due to performing the same task over and over in the vineyard. Just for me…I have 3130 vines…so you do the same thing many times.
As you can see the tool’s energy is supplied by a battery pack that you belt on…and all you do is load a very long tie that is cut when you pull the trigger. The battery is supposed to last 10,000 pulls…or almost enough to do my entire vineyard. However, given the monotonous nature of tying, I will probably only do a few hours at a time until I finish in about 10 hours.
In the last post I gave you an update about the drought here in California. The net is we still need a lot of rain in the next 2 months.
2013 our vines were in their 4th leaf (still young and the roots not fully developed) so I was trying to wean them from water to develop the roots better and help the pH of the grapes. Unfortunately, I went a little to far and the renewal spurs for cane pruning did not fully develop. So, this years crop will be a little smaller than expected…which is OK since we are short of water again and I don’t want to stress the vines so early in their life. What does that mean for those who don’t know the lingo…in the picture above, the “arms” for his year did not grow enough on some of the vines. What will I do in 2014? I’m going to make sure we get enough water until the fruit is “set” which should be enough for 2015. So much to learn…and I guess you don’t learn unless something happens to you.
If you have been watching the news you should have heard that California is in a severe drought. We had about 20% of our normal rainfall last year and the previous years were OK, but not to normal.
Last week (2/6/14-2/9/14) we had our first real winter rain storm of the season and we got 10.7″ of rain. Unlike where I grew up in Olympia, WA where it rains 1/4″ a day all winter, we get our rain in downpours and then it clears up. So this was bigger than a normal storm but not unwelcome. Since we normally get 40″ a year, and this storm put us to 15″, we still have a ways to go to refill our aquifers and get the ground fully saturated.
The other thing you may have heard is that some towns in California will run out of water. True…depending on where they get their water. Here in Sebastopol we have a good aquifer that so far has not been affected by the drought. We use this aquifer for Turtle Vines. Even though we are a new vineyard we are striving to use as little water as possible. I probably went to far last year as we did not get enough renewal spurs, but that is for the next post.
We tested our well last week. It is drilled to 170′ and right now we are at 61′ to the water table. Later in the year when we begin watering, we will test it again and also find out how fast it recharges after use. Just FYI…When we purchased our home 6 years ago they said the well was good for 20 gallons/min. We set up 4 sections in the vineyard and they only draw around 7 gal/min.
This is the map of the recent storm. We are near the Graton station.
I had to repost this…a recent discovery of a 3700 year old wine cellar. I sure hope the wine we are growing and making now at Turtle Vines is cellar worthy for several years but fruit forward enough to drink now! Will see in a few months when we bottle our 2012 Pinot Noir.
A group of archaeologists have discovered one of the oldest wine cellars ever in a ruined palace in northern Israel. The palace once sat in the ancient Canaanite city of Tel Kabri. Interestingly, the ancient city isn’t far from the modern wineries in the country. The scientists discovered 40 3-feet tall jars in an ancient storage room.
No liquid could have survived thousands of years in storage. The scientists determined that the storage vessels held wine by analyzing organic residue left in the pores of the jar. The analysis reveled that they had contained wine made from grapes.
The researchers say that the ancient wine would have been sweet, strong, and likely medicinal. The team believed they were digging outside the ancient palace walls when they discovered the ancient wine containers. Another ancient wine cellar holding about 700 jars was found in the tomb of the Egyptian Pharaoh Scorpion I in Egypt dating to about 3000 BC.
Since grapes didn’t grow in the wild in Egypt, scientists had long believed the wine was imported form Canaanites. The finding of the ancient wine cellar in the Canaanite palace supports that theory. The scientists believe that if they can gather enough data about the ancient wine, they may be able to recreate the flavor.