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Archive for the ‘Harvest’ Category
Friday, October 15th, 2010
Harvest is on the down slope at this point. Except for Syrah at Salaal and on Edna Ranch Oceanside we’ve got everything harvested. Today we’re pressing Grenache for our 2010 Rosé. I’m guessing we’ll have about a week or two’s hiatus and then bring in the Syrah. A lot depends on the weather of course. For example today’s soaking wet fog didn’t further ripeness very much. There’s still plenty to do around the cellar. The Pinot Noirs just finished going down to barrel, and they look to be fine wines. They are dark, fresh and juicy. They may even rival the ’07s which is saying a lot. The early whites like Pinot Gris and Viognier are almost finished fermenting. I love the way these wines taste right at the end of fermentation. They are exuberantly aromatic; they perfume the entire cellar. With Chardonnay it is way too early to tell, you don’t have a good grip on Chardonnay quality until January or February at the earliest – sometimes much later. It is a shy wine or maybe coy is the better word. The heart of this harvest was very compressed. We only brought our first fruit in three weeks ago and we’re just about done – a fast and furious one for sure.
- Larry Brooks, Winemaker
Posted via email from Tolosa Winery
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Thursday, September 30th, 2010
Today we bring in the last of the ’10 Pinot. It will have taken us exactly one week to drag in all the Pinot. I’m pretty sure that this is the most compressed vintage I have ever experienced. Normally the harvest would spread over two to three weeks. The Chardonnay looks like it might be equally compressed. It has been a long cool growing season and the unseasonable heat over the weekend really pushed things along. I am so happy to have the capability of night harvesting in a year like this. It was just too hot during the day the last four days to pick. But with our light rigs we were able to start picking at 3:00 AM and stop at 9:00 or so before the heat came on. The Pinot looks really nice so far though we don’t have a completely dry tank yet. The color is bright and dense and the fruit aromatic intensity is good. I’m cautiously excited.
- Larry Brooks, Winemaker
Posted via email from Tolosa Winery
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Tuesday, August 31st, 2010
Our vineyard management company Pacific Vineyards just sent over a link to our real time weather station that was installed last winter. It was placed in our Chardonnay Block 585, which is in our Edna Ranch West Vineyards, off of Corbett Canyon Rd. This photo is a snapshot of the weather station from today August 31st at 3:15pm. The station reports temperature, humidity, wind mph & direction, radiation, rainfall, growing degree days and so much more. I can only imagine the useful data and information that our vineyard and winemaking team will accumulate from this new tool!
Who needs the weatherman? If you ever need a weather report just give Tolosa a call!
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Monday, July 26th, 2010
This week is the beginning of the ripening cycle for the vine. In the very earliest blocks of Pinot Noir the berries are starting to turn from green to purple. This is one of those stages in vine development that are always referred to by their French names. This color change stage is called veraison. It’s a pretty word isn’t it? I start spending more and more time in the vineyard now. It is possible at this stage to see clearly the variation within the vineyard blocks and that information can be noted for better picking decisions at ripeness. For example in two of the three blocks I walked yesterday I saw section of the block that were behind in the color change. These sections will be sampled, and most likely harvested separately and later than the rest of the block. It is harder to notice these subtle differences later when all the berries and clusters are uniformly colored. It is only possible to see these variations when the veraison is 50-80% complete.
-Larry Brooks, Winemaker
Posted via email from Tolosa Winery
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Thursday, May 21st, 2009
Our earliest blocks of Pinot Noir are in bloom this week. Grapes are no different than other plants, and their fruits are the product of flowers. The grape flowers are tiny, but nonetheless have a sweet aroma that can be detected by putting your nose right up against the cluster during flowering. Once you are acquainted with the perfume you can smell them quite easily from quite a distance on a warm day. I can tell when bloom begins in a given vineyard well before I'm close enough to actually see the blossoms. This is the real start of the vintage as far as I'm concerned, because shortly after bloom the berries which will make this year's wine start forming. The period from bloom to harvest is also the time period whose length is least variable. Traditional wisdom says 100 days from bloom to harvest, but my experience tells me that it is closer to 120 days most years. So for Pinot Noir for 2009 I can say with reasonable certainty that we will do our first harvesting on or about the 10th of September. You can also see variation within the vineyard at this time of year so it is important to visit all the blocks and see how evenly they are going through bloom as this will tell you whether or not the ripening will be uniform within the blocks and also between the blocks.
- Larry Brooks
Tags: bloom, grape flowers, pinot
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