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Saturday, April 1, 2023

Vintage 2023: April is Here

Today, the first day of April brought rain during the day and some late afternoon sunshine. We have been busy in the vineyard with pruning duties. We're doing pretty well getting the vines pruned but we're going to need Mother Nature's cooperation!
This season we began in February by bringing in all of the branch locks (Agfast) that we put in the growing canopy to give each shoot space from it's neighbor to provide airflow, inportant in keeping mildews and diseases at bay. Compared to information in our 2022 spreadsheet, we brought in the last Agfast on April 17! Bringing in the Agfasts allows us to do our next task which is to free last year's fruiting canes by cutting off wires and tendrils. I do this task ahead of of my husband who is pruning and deciding which year old canes will be this year's fruiting canes.
He has pruned about a third of the vineyard, which is quite good because we were no where near this place last year. Each year we refine the tasks we do in order that the pruning tasks are done before budbreak.
So we ask Mother Nature to provide us with cool but dry days in April so that we can beat the bud break clock!

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