Bloom and Fruitset

On June 12th, I wrote a blog called Stages of Flowering and predicted that flowering would be on July 6th. Well, while we were nipping and tucking our Cabernet Sauvignon, my husband looked over to the Chardonnay and saw that some of our plants were flowering! That was way back on June 19th!
Why is knowing the date of flowering important? With the data that we have been tracking, we believe that between flowering and harvest, in our vineyard, it is approximately 90 days. If flowering came on July 6th, that puts harvest around October 4th.
We have come to learn that our Chardonnay is always the first to bloom (also called anthesis), but we were surprised to see that our Cabernet Franc was also in bloom! On June 21st, here is where our vineyard stood with respect to percentage flowering:

Variety	% Bloom on June 21
Chardonnay	50%
Cabernet Franc	40%
Auxerrois	40%
Chenin Blanc	10%
Cabernet Sauvignon	Not in bloom yet

It is very interesting to have visitors in the vineyard during bloom because many believe that the pre-bloom flowers are already the young grapes.

Superficially, the two stages do look remarkably alike, but on closer inspection, there is a discernible difference. The pre-bloom grape buds have ridges that are formed by the presence of the calyptra or flower cap which are actually the petals of the grape flower.
Since flowering is a full 2 weeks earlier than what I thought, our harvest should be more like the end of September, Mother Nature willing!

Rethinking Our Vineyard Trellis

This year, we have been spending an inordinate amount of time with shoot positioning. We believe that one of the problems that is causing us to spend so much time with shoot positioning is that the distance between the fruiting wire and the first set of catchwires is 12-inches.

When we were first contemplating how to construct our trellis system, one of the sources that we consulted, along with the many books that we have was the online reference Vineyard Trellis Construction, a very practical guide put together by Dr. Paul Domoto of Iowa State University, Viticulture Extension.
One illustration which was helpful in determining where to put our catchwires was this:

Our Manwerkes linepost has slots every 4-inches apart so that initially dictated our catch wire spacing. We decided on fixed catch wires instead of movable catch wires, so our three sets of catch wires are spaced 12-inches apart. When we didn't have a full vineyard, tucking in our growing vines was not such a huge task. Now that we are almost up to repopulating our vineyard, this has become a time-consuming task.
So, what is our solution? Our plan after this growing season is over is to raise the fruiting wire one notch on the Manwerkes line post. Raising the fruiting wire will shorten the distance between the first set of fixed catch wires to 8-inches.
Grapevines grow quickly after budbreak. The photo below shows grapevines two weeks after budbreak. Our thinking is that by raising our fruiting wire, most of the growing shoots will grow through the first catch wires, putting them on the right trajectory to grow vertically through the remaining catch wires.

Canopy Management: Nip and Tuck

Our friends have been helping us in the vineyard since spring and one of the tasks that we are doing is called shoot thinning and positioning. I like to refer to this as nip and tuck. We began in May with the task of disbudding, which is the removal of buds from positions along the cane that are too close together or not turning upward toward the sunlight.
May disbudding activities:
During May, we did the first pass of disbudding approximately 6,000 vines which took 4 days.
The second pass occurred from May 23 to May 31st. During this pass, we were once again disbudding shoots that were growing toward the ground and also shoots that were too close together. We are doing this to divert energy into the remaining growing shoots and also to open up the canopy so that we can get a good amount of air flow to prevent the occurrence of fungal diseases.

Some of our vines were farther along and we were pruning shoots and whenever possible, saving 4 shoots to serve as next year's canes.

June nip and tuck activities:
During the first weeks in June, we had cool weather and rain so the shoots jumped up. Some of our vines have decided that they have so much energy that they would send out their secondary and tertiary buds, necessitating us to implement nipping as well as tucking procedures. Our friends came to give us a hand at the task.:

This work continues unabated!

2017 Bel Lago Sparkling Auxerrois

Our friends were in Michigan recently visiting relatives. When we heard that, we asked them to check out Bel Lago Winery and they gladly did. They said they had a good time, and got to meet Charlie Edson, the person that my husband had been communicating with about Bel Lago's Auxerrois.
We cannot purchase Bel Lago's wines here in Connecticut so when the opportunity arose, we asked our friends to bring back a bottle of Auxerrois for us. A few nights ago, we tasted Bel Lago's 2017 Sparkling Auxerrois, with hand written notes by Charlie.

We all enjoyed the Sparkling Auxerrois. My husband thought the wine had the purity of Auxerrois fruit flavor with a backbone of good acidity and a touch of lasting mouthfeel from the other minor components.There was a very nice balance to the sparkling wine from first taste to finish. Everyone in our group gave it a very big thumbs up.

Stages of Flowering

Still lots of work to do but at the moment, we are waiting for the vineyard to flower. It takes approximately 60 days from budbreak to flowering, or anthesis. For us that will be around July 6, which seems really late. We do have a week of warm weather coming up so hopefully the flowers will bloom a little earlier.
I frequently refer to Ed Hellman's chart of grapevine principle growth stages, in the online publication Grapevine Structure and Function.
Here is a timeline of how the flowers look during the various stages until flowering:

Stage	Example
Principal Growth Stage 1: Leaf development. Stage 13. 3 leaves unfolded. May 14, 2018
Principal Growth Stage 1: Leaf development. Stage 15. More leaves unfolded. May 28, 2018
Principal growth stage 5: Inflorescence emerge. Inflorescences fully developed; flowers separating. June 12, 2018

If flowering is going to occur approximately on July 6 this year, we have a few more weeks to go.

National Chenin Blanc Day

We love Chenin Blanc! Almost half of our vineyard is planted in Chenin Blanc. So, you will find us celebrating National Chenin Blanc Day which this year is on June 15th, next Friday.
Our love of Chenin Blanc began after tasting Domaine Huet and was made more indelible after reading Wine and War by Don and Petie Kladstrup. In the introduction to this book published in 2001, Don and Petie Kladstrup recount the time they went to visit Gaston Huet and he let them taste a wine which he brought up from his cellar. The Klatstrups first guessed that it was a 1976, a great year in the Loire Valley. Wrong. They guessed 1969, 1959, 1953 and they were wrong each time. The wine that they were drinking was Gaston Huet's 1947 vintage. They wrote that it tasted like honey and apricots, lusciously sweet, yet fresh and alive. Yes, that is Chenin Blanc!
My next recollection of having a refreshing Chenin Blanc was in 2011, when we had a 2009 Petit Chenin made by South Africa's Ken Forrester. We had paired the wine with raw oysters and it was heaven!
Also in 2011, I was taking the U.C. Davis online Enology and Viticulture course and needed to know what kind of vines, rootstock and clones our hypothetical vineyard would be planted with. During an online search, I learned that Charles Massoud, owner of Paumanok Vineyards had planted Chenin Blanc! So, in fulfillment of my course requirement, I emailed him and got a response from Charles within 24 hours! The story of Charles' Chenin Blanc plantings is also very interesting and full of serendipity. In a 2011 article called The Massoud Family & Paumanok Vineyard: Leading Vintners of Long Island’s North Fork in the Huffington Post, Kareem Massoud, son of Charles Massoud recounts the story of his father's entry into growing Chenin Blanc:
“Paumanok’s Chenin plantation was pure serendipity. My parents had no intention of planting Chenin when we first bought the farm. The Chenin vines came with a property they purchased across the street. My father had begun to rip out the vines. As the growing season moved in on him, he ran out of time. A German vineyard caretaker at the time encouraged my father to leave the vines and give them a chance as they appeared ‘happy and healthy here’. And so he did. Chenin does in fact grow well here...Year in and year out , it consistently produces a wine that is fresh, crisp, and redolent of citrus fruits, especially grapefruit.”
So, get yourself some Chenin Blanc and celebrate on June 15th, National Chenin Blanc Day. When you do, consider this Chenin Blanc Wine Aroma Wheel prepared by Stellenbosch University’s Institute for Wine Biotechnology, Department of Viticulture and Oenology, Chenin Blanc Association of South Africa, Platter’s South African Wine Guide and Chenin Blanc producing cellars. See where on the Aroma Wheel your Chenin Blanc falls. Happy Drinking!

Bird Sightings in the Vineyard

One of the things that we like about the vineyard is the diversity of life on this land. In May 2016, we had a person from the Audubon Society give us an assessment of the bird life on our property. Since that time, we have been watching and listening to the various birds that inhabit this land.
In June 2016, we were delighted to see a pair of mating Baltimore Orioles. Since that time, the Orioles have returned annually to set up their nest.

Also in 2016, we caught a glimpse of an Indigo bunting, but we were never able to get a good enough photo. My husband is now borrowing our friend's Panasonic Lumix camera and he was finally able to get pictures of the Indigo bunting. Apparently, this is the bird's favorite perch.

We have also seen these birds. We know the Eastern Towhee is around when we hear the call "Drink your tea":

Here are some of the common birds that are not afraid of being near us:

And then there are these birds that can be found in the vineyard, except during turkey hunting season, much to the dismay of our hunter and us because wild turkey is good eats!

Bad Bug: Black Vine Weevil (Otiorhyncus sulcatus)

Early on in our career as farmers, we saw a kind of damage to our grapevines that we thought was due to deer. The tops of the young, growing vines would be cleanly chomped off. Deer! We engaged our hunter to see if he could rid the vineyard of this nuisance. As time went on, we learned that the type of damage that we were seeing was not due to deer, but due to a much, much smaller offender, the Black Vine Weevil (Otiorhyncus sulcatus). This bug is so tiny, not much larger than 1/2-inch but it can do serious damage to buds, flowers, foliage and cluster rachis.
I consulted University of California IPM Site, to learn more about this little pest.
The adults emerge from the soil in early April through May. About 2 to 3 weeks after they emerge, females begin laying eggs and continue for 6 to 8 weeks. Eggs hatch into white grubs (larvae) that feed on roots. Larvae feed for about 10 months before pupating in the soil during late winter.

This weevil has a long and broad snout, that projects from the front of the head. The snout is the offending appendage since this is what the weevil uses to pierce vine parts when it is feeding. The telltale sign that the damage is done by beetles (and not deer) is the presence of small holes in the growing shoot. The small holes become the weak point and snap off. It is really unfortunate if this damage appears on what should be next year's cane!