Cogitating Pruning

The days are becoming warmer and our thoughts are turning to pruning the vineyard. In the past, our pruning times have varied, largely based on the fact that we were also replanting the vineyard.
In 2014, we began pruning in mid April. In 2015, we again began pruning in mid-April. It took us only a day to prune all of the vines, and in looking at the chart that I put on the blog, we only had 580 plants to prune that year. In 2016, we decided that we would begin pruning in March. The spring of 2016 was an extremely warm year with temperatures reaching 80 degrees in the mid-Atlantic states in March! This was also the year that we would be replanting about 4200 vines so we thought we should get a head start in pruning. In 2017, we were back to pruning in mid-April. This year, we know that we will have many more vines for which we can lay down the canes.
The goal is to make each vine look like this:¹

Here is an example of a cane we laid down last year.

The rule of thumb for the spacing of each bud on the cane is that they should be at least a fist width apart. Since our vines are planted at 4 feet intervals, our canes will be 2-1/2 feet in length and have at most 5 buds on each side of the trunk. In laying down our canes, we hope to orient the buds so that they are facing the sun so that the growing shoot will grow vertically. We will disbud the shoots that are growing toward the ground.
References:
1. Ronald Jackson, Wine Science Third Edition, Elsevier, 2008, pg. 124.

1995 Sylvain Cathiard Romanee-Saint-Vivant Grand Cru

My husband claims that he brought this bottle of Burgundy out for me on Valentine's Day. What I remember was that we drank this wine without any food at all. We sipped it for hours while it opened up. At first, I got umami and beef broth notes, but by the end of the glass, I totally got violets, the wine was morphing, revealing layers of complexity. The wine was full bodied, lushly extracted and still very dark purple in color. There was no oxidation that I was aware of and this wine is already 23 years old. The nice thing about the wine is that it still is youthful tasting and can be cellared for a while longer.
Just for yucks, here is the price history of his bottle of Pinot Noir.

Vintage 2018: Winter Temperatures

Mother Nature is unpredictable. I started keeping a closer eye on her so that I could remember what each vintage was like and wrote blogposts pertaining to the weather as it affected our vineyard. I collated all those blogposts under a tab called Vintage Notes.
I found it to be a good reminder of what the various years that we have been growing grapes have been like. 2015 was our first full year with a harvest. Today, I'm continuing those vintage notes.
The winter of 2017-2018 started in December with a cold snap just in time for the Christmas holidays. My husband recently downloaded the data from the new Onset HOBO Data Loggers that he installed in December. The data logger logged information from December 8 to February 7 and showed us that we had a few instances of subzero temperatures.

Temperatures that are detrimental to vine survival are prolonged durations of temperatures lower than -10^o F. Since the data logger is showing that the cold dips were not too long, we think that we are okay. The winter of 2014 was unseasonably cold so I researched and wrote a blog on How to Test for Bud Injury, which we referred to
On Saturday February 17th to Sunday morning, February 18th, the forecasters were predicting 3-7 inches of snow in our area. It ended up being 1 inch of snow, and now we are in for a few days of record warmth.

Genetic Research Shows That Syrah is the Offspring of Pinot

A blogpost I wrote in 2013 called Cofermentation of Syrah and Viognier, contained this information:
"...Syrah and Viognier are Rhone varieties and appear to be genetic siblings."
At that time, to validate this information, I went to consult the massive compendium, Wine Grapes¹ and there it was---Syrah is the genetic offspring of Mondeuse Blanche and Dureza and one of the parents of Viognier is Mondeuse Blanche, so it looks like they are half-siblings."
Since I'm on this grape genetics kick, I wanted to go to the source, so I looked online and found that in 2006, Vouillamoz et al. published their research on French and Italian grapes and their genetic relationships.²
They analyzed 89 grape cultivars with 60 microsatellite markers (for a refresher on "microsatellite markers" please check out my blog on National Clonal Germplasm Database) in order to accurately calculate the identity-by-descent (IBD) and relatedness (r) coefficients among six putatively related cultivars.
The six cultivars they used in this study were the French varieties Pinot, Syrah and Dureza and the Northern Italian varities Teroldego, Lagrein, and Marzemino. The study wanted to determine if any of these cultivars were related.
Using the likelihood based kinship approach allowed the detection of full siblings (FS) and 21 relatives without knowledge of their parents. Parentage is most likely to be found when two cultivars share at least one allele at each locus, a pre-requisite for demonstrating a parent–offspring (PO) relationship. In order to demonstrate parentage, these shared alleles would have to be identical by descent (IBD), meaning that they are recently descended from a single ancestral allele, and not simply identical by state (IBS), which can happen by chance. In practice, only identity by state (IBS) can be scored and identity by descent (IBD) must be inferred.
The data data strongly confirmed the ‘Syrah’ parentage to consist of Dureza and Mondeuse Blanche, previously established by Bowers et al. Further, the detection of an unexpected genetic relationship between Pinot and Syrah, lead to the following relationship diagram shown below:²

In the Robinson et al. Wine Grapes bible, more detail is provided on the genetic relationship between Pinot and Syrah, as well as Viognier:¹

If it wasn't for Pinot, we would not have the ancient varieites of Dureza and Mondeuse Blanc. And if not for those cultivars, no Viognier, no Syrah!
One can imagine in an ancient field of Mondeuse Blanche, the emergence of Viognier and Syrah offspring. In a field such as this, it is not difficult to imagine that early harvesters brought in both Viognier and Syrah and began the tradition of cofermentation of the two varieties.
References:
1. J. Robinson, J. Harding and J. Vouillamoz, Wine Grapes - A complete guide to 1,368 vine varieties, including their origins and flavours, pg 1026, Allen Lane 2012 ISBN 978-1-846-14446-2.
2. Vouillamoz JF1, Grando MS., Genealogy of wine grape cultivars: "Pinot" is related to "Syrah", Heredity (Edinb), 2006, Aug;97(2):102-10.

2016 Vietti Roero Arneis

We have been drinking Arneis ever since we first had a glass of this, for us, unusual sounding wine, in the early 2000s in a restaurant in Rhode Island. We were happy when we found a 2009 Arneis made by Vietti that I blogged about in 2012. Not only was the wine delicious and a departure from Chardonnay, I learned that some consider Alfredo Currado to be the father of Arneis, saving this variety from extinction.
We drank this Arneis with parchment paper wrapped red snapper that my husband made. Notes of tropical fruit with no reductive aromas, flavors of stone fruit, honey and spice made for a great pairing with dinner.

Visiting Liquid Farm

After tasting the 2015 Liquid Farm White Hills Chardonnay that we really enjoyed, my husband and I wanted very much to visit their winery to learn how they made their Chardonnay.
The tasting room for Liquid Farm is located in Lompoc. We were familiar with the Industrial Wine Movement in Lompoc, having visited Steve Clifton at Palmina in 2015. We drove north out of Los Angeles on Interstate 101, where the mudslides had occurred and found that it had been totally cleared. Evidence of the fires were visible. It took us about 3 hours to make the journey and met up with Jeff Nelson, owner of Liquid Farm. He brought us to the "back of the house" to meet with winemaker, James Sparks.

Jeff let us taste their Rosé of Mourvédre that was still in the tank and awaiting bottling. James explained that the Mourvédre is grown and harvested specifically to make rosé and they do not use saignee to create their rosé. We also tasted their very limited edition Four Chardonnay. I got a chance to speak with James and he mentioned that they like to keep the pH of their Chardonnay close to 3 and the titratable acids around 7. We are in that ballpark with our Chardonnay! James makes all his Chardonnay in oak barrels and lets each barrel speak to him about the need for bâtonnage. I am totally on the same page with James about listening to the wine and doing only what it tells you to do. Winemaking is never a formulaic process. Jeff also told us that we only have one chance to get the little details right before we release our first vintage so my husband is going back to the drawing board with our labels and our logo. They also seal their bottles with wax and during our visit, Ravi was painstakingly involved in doing this task.

Our visit to Liquid Farm came to an end in no time at all! We decided to go to one of our favorite places to have lunch--Industrial Eats in Buellton. Buellton is the place that was made famous in the movie "Sideways", it is also home to the original "Andersens Pea Soup". Jeff gave us some driving directions on Santa Rosa Road that would take us to Buellton and our destination.
It was after lunch and on a Monday, so we had no problems finding a seat and put in our order. The special for Monday was patty melt so my husband and I decided to split that sandwich and just in case we ordered their Korean style wings. We assumed that the wings were the usual, small plate of 6 chicken wings. Our patty melt came first with a huge half of romaine that was lightly dressed and delicious. Half way through our HUGE sandwich, the chicken wings arrived. We looked at the plate and told our server, "What were we thinking?" To which she replied, "I'll get you a takeout box". Apparently, this phenomenon of over ordering was not new to her!

We had a great day trip to Lompoc, made some new friends, learned a lot, had a great lunch and headed back to Los Angeles, our trip to California was drawing to a close. On this Monday, we were told by our friends in Connecticut that they had 4-7 inches of unexpected snow on the shoreline!

Last Word From the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium Trade Show

The Unified Wine and Grape Symposium Trade Show is a great place to check out various Wine and Vineyard related tools. This coming March, we will be faced with pruning 6,000 vines. My husband is in the market for a battery operated pruner that is light but powerful and keeps a charge for a long time. This is one of those tools that we found to be best to check out in person. How light is the battery, how heavy are the pruners, how powerful are the pruners, what is the warranty? We went with one preconceived notion in mind, but in testing the two options, we felt that one was superior. Had we not been at the trade show, we might have made a somewhat costly mistake.

Another reason to attend the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium Trade Show was to hook up with people in the business.

We ran into Sebastian, whom we worked with when we originally ordered our custom grafted tall vines. We first met Sebastian when we went to California in 2011 to check out nurseries and people we might work with. I blogged about it in A Visit to Mercier Grapevine Nursery. Since Mercier changed hands, we hadn't seen Sebastian, so this was a very pleasant reunion.

When we planted our Auxerrois last year, Kevin provided the budwood from their family operated nursery in Washington State. We are partial to the smaller nurseries because, being a small business ourselves, we feel that we have a connection with them. My husband was in contact with Kevin during the off-season to see if we could get more Auxerrois and Barbera to finish populating our vineyard. Kevin had mentioned that their tall grafted vines were 24 inches, not quite up to our specification of 32 inches, so it looked like we might have to wait until 2020 to get our custom grafts. But when we saw Kevin at the Trade Show, and talked with him, he said that he does have additional rootstock and that he could possibly fill our order! This is very good news because that means that we will be able to put in the remaining 800 vines in 2019. In our eyes, one year makes a big difference. We did look at tanks and destemmers and a whole lot of other equipment. So, all in all the time at the Trade Show was very productive.
Previous post related to the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium Trade Show:
Photos from the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium Trade Show

National Clonal Germplasm Database

I want to get back to a little bit more scientific content in my blog so today, I'm posting about a research paper that I am reading. I learned that the USDA keeps a Grape Germplasm Database for grapes.
On that page is the following article: Genetic structure and differentiation in cultivated grape, Vitis vinifera L. and explains how genetic relationships among grapevines were determined.¹
The study evaluated the genetic diversity, structure and differentiation in a grape germplasm collection using polymorphisms at eight microsatellite loci, VVS2, VVMD5, VVMD6, VVMD7, VVMD27, VVMD28, VVMD31 and VVMD32.
Just what are microsatellites and why are they so useful? Microsatellite markers or single sequence repeats (SSRs) contain from 1 to 10 nucleotides. They are:²

• Abundant
• Multi-allelic
• Highly polymorphic
• Efficient and accurate for detecting genetic polymorphism
• Co-dominant

All of the above attributes leads to SSRs being the markers of choice for population genetic analysis to assess genetic structure and differentiation in germplasm collections and natural populations.
For wild species SSRs are used:

• (i) in studies of diversity measured on the basis of genetic distance
• (ii) to estimate gene flow and crossing over rates
• (iii) in evolutionary studies, above all to infer infraspecific genetic relations

For cultivated plants SSRs are commonly used for:

• (i) constructing linkage maps
• (ii) mapping loci involved in quantitative traits (QTL)
• (iii) estimating the degree of kinship between genotypes
• (iv) using marker-assisted selection
• (v) defining cultivar DNA fingerprints

Using microsatellite loci information, the researchers examined the consequences of isolation of eastern and western populations during the glacial period and post-glacial proliferation for population differentiation, climatic adaptations and early selection and cultivation by man. They also elucidated the genetic relationship between cultivated and wild grapes to draw inferences about the history of domestication. This research resulted in the classification of grape cultivars by eco-geographic variation and resulted in the following groupings:

• Occidentalis, the small-berried wine grapes of western Europe
• Orientalis, the large-berried table grapes of West Asia
• Pontica, the intermediate type from the basin of the Black Sea and eastern Europe

The data resulted in the following unrooted tree (phenogram) with 16 recognizable groups structured into three major clusters:

One of the clusters included the Gouais Blanc X Pinot Noir relations that I blogged about in Determining Genetic Relationships Between Auxerrois and Chardonnay.
References:
1. Malikarjuna K. Aradhya, Gerald S. Dangl, Bernard H. Prins, Jean-Michel Boursiquot, M. Andrew Walker, Carole P. Meredith, and Charles J. Simon, Genetic structure and differentiation in cultivated grape, Vitis vinifera L., Genet. Res., Camb. (2003), 81, pp. 179–192.
2. Vieira MLC, Santini L, Diniz AL, Munhoz C de F., Microsatellite markers: what they mean and why they are so useful, Genetics and Molecular Biology, 2016;39(3):312-328, doi:10.1590/1678-4685-GMB-2016-0027.

Photos from the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium Trade Show

Another reason that we timed our visit to California was to attend the Trade Show at the Unified Wine and Grape Symposium. The last time we attended this event was in 2012, a year before we put in our vines. This time, we had specific products that we wanted to see up close and personal. Here are just a few photos from the huge gathering of vendors at the show, not necessarily representing the vendors we went to see. I just thought these were interesting.

More photos from the Trade Show coming in the next posts.

2015 Liquid Farm White Hills Chardonnay

On our way to visit my sister-in-law in San Diego, my husband stopped at Hi-Time Cellars, one of his favorite places for the procurement of unusual wines that we cannot get on the East Coast. We picked up 3 different Chardonnays and out of the bunch, we liked this the best.
I've forgotten what we ate with this 2015 Liquid Farm White Hills Chardonnay but, the flavors were outstanding. The bouquet was inviting, no off putting odors and the flavors of fruit, acid, a subtle oak influence were in perfect balance that lead to an inviting complexity. I could drink this wine all night long!

Visit to California

Full disclosure: We have been out of town for the past 2 weeks visiting family in California and then attending the Unified Grape and Wine Symposium in Sacramento. We went out to California early enough to fit in a trip to a winery in San Diego near where my sister-in-law lives. Since I'm still acclimating to the time change, this blog will be on the light side with just photos. Here is what I saw:

As picturesque as the above photo is, I think this is an old basket press and not a fermenting vat. What do you think? Here is something else that is quite amazing. Storage tanks. Enjoy!