Hurricane Irene and the Northeast Grape Growing Season

If this year hasn't already been a challenging year for grape growing, we are currently bracing for the impact of Hurricane Irene.
I've been mindful of the weather this year, superimposing the weather on the grape growing season. It was a cool spring that morphed into a foggy, cooler than normal summer. Our friends told us that veraison was at least two weeks later than last year, but rather normal for the Northeast. However, around the time of veraison, there was a tropical storm that came through Connecticut on August 15th bringing in it's wake 5-7 inches of rain. I could just see the grapes swelling and bloating with all that rain!
The newscasters are saying that the hurricane is losing some of it's integrity around the eye, but that it will still pack some serious winds and rain.

2009 Domaine Cheveau Macon Chaintre Le Clos

I never knew what "bracing acidity" was until I tasted this Domaine Cheveau Macon Chaintre. This chardonnay had a surprisingly aromatic nose of lemons, pears and peaches and had a lemon yellow color.

The aroma was inviting, the flavor was one of lemons and very high acidity. My juvenile palate was surprised, but tried not to rebel at this somewhat different (to me) approach to chardonnay. We drank it on our porch after a sweaty day of working on the land with no food. This wine will be a good complement to seafood.
My husband assures me that we have had Neal Rosenthal imported wines before but after reading "Reflections of a Wine Merchant", I am paying more attention to who imported the wine that I am drinking. Chaintre is one of four communes in Pouilly Fuisse and Le Clos is the vineyard that the grapes come from. This labeling is indicative of Neal Rosenthal's desire to have the wines that he imports be identified with the vineyard that produced the grapes.

To Inoculate or Not, that is the Question

My UC Davis Wine Production notes state that the first decision of the winemaker is to conduct the fermentation with vineyard flora (should it really be fauna?) or with commercial yeasts. This topic was one that we discussed at length in the Wine Production forum and I bring it up again because it seems that natural wine relies on "wild or indigenous yeast" to conduct the fermentation. The yeast strains that are resident on grapes in sufficient numbers to conduct fermentation are Pichia, Kloekera, Dekkara, Candida and Brettanomyces. These wild yeast are not very alcohol tolerant (4-6% ethanol) and are SO₂ sensitive, which is why winemakers use SO₂ very early on to kill the wild yeast.
When I was taking the course, I asked the question: typical levels of Saccharomyces found as berry microflora are on the order of 10^-2 (1 cell in 100mL) to 10^-3(1 cell in 1 L or 1 part per million). If the initial inoculum should contain 10⁵ to 10⁶ cells/mL, how does one attain that level of Saccharomyces in a newly constructed winery?
One of my classmates responded giving me an "Ahhhh...I got it moment" when he wrote: if the doubling time is 6 hours, then in 2 days there would be just 1280 cells, but in 5 days, or 20 doublings that number would increase to 5,242,880. Assuming there's enough nutrients and they are balanced.
There is a really good article written by Jordon P. Ross on Wild Yeast in Winemaking that discusses California wineries using wild or uninoculated fermenations.
We will be a small winery (< 1500 cases) so I'm thinking I'd like to try uninoculated fermentations. Things to consider: Saccharomyces usually undergo at most 40 doublings. If a winery has used commercial yeast, it takes at least 3 years to rid the winery (i.e. on the equipment, from the pomace, etc) of the commercial yeast.

Reflections of a Wine Merchant

In 2008, Neal Rosenthal wrote a book called "Reflections of a Wine Merchant", a wistful recollection of a firm believer of terroir and tradition about his entry into the wine business in 1977 through the 80's. Knowing wine in the 70's was a lesson in geography. Wines were not labeled by their varietal but by the piece of land that they grew on and it was up to the consumer to understand what that meant. Rosenthal was in search of wines that reflected not only the soil, climate and grape type but the undefinable, the magic that occurs to grapes during elevage, "the time between fermentation and bottling, that man's hand and mind can interfere."
There are fifteen chapters in this book and each chapter takes a look at a particular incident in Rosenthal's search for wines that would comprise his portfolio. His early chapters reveal a youthful Rosenthal learning how to discern a good wine by trusting in his palate. As the book progresses, Rosenthal's recollection becomes more complex, a bit more philosophical, much like how a good wine ages. By turns humorous, nostalgic, tragic and inspiring, Rosenthal's book transported me to the places he visited and I wished that it was me sitting at the table and having dinner with the winemaker's family and tasting the wines he drank.