Hopes for a farmer’s miracle of sorts with a very late budburst and normal harvest time (=short growing season)  have now officially been dashed with the collection of our first grape chemistry readings of the year, as posted earlier today.  While we would gag to call this a “cool” summer by the common understanding of the term, it has been a summer of moderate heat by Foothills standards that got off to an unseasonably cool start in June.  Perhaps this is the reason that, despite veraision at a fairly normal time in July, ripening has taken its own sweet time.   We are now looking for harvest of our primitivo in mid-September and barbera in late September.  The Portugese varietal grapes should reach optimal ripeness in a range spanning from early September (tempranillo) to mid-October (souzao).

Earlier this month, we did a round of fruit dropping in the primitivo that we may supplement with some fine-tuning given the extra time till ripening and vines that are beginning to look tired.  We have dropped seconds in a portion of Block 1 of the barbera and will likely do more of this, as the abundant green seconds stand out readily against the blue-purple main fruit. 

We have deployed bird netting on the bookends of the primitivo vineyard that are closest to trees and ever-hungry, marauding birds, as well as in Block 4 of the barbera.  The port vineyard is completely enclosed in permanent overhead netting that is keeping all but a few enterprising birds off the fruit.  Birds have already done a number, via daylight attacks, on our back hilltop primitivo grapes that ripen earlier than the rest and are closest to trees.  Thirsty rodents, meanwhile, have begun eating holes in distant driplines by night in the same section.  We often get the latter late in the season, but apparently the rodents missed the memo about the later harvest, and they have chowed down already.  On the positive side, temperatures have moderated after a recent heat spell and are expected to remain that way for another week, which should promote ripening without dehyration in the near-term.

We’ve recently endured a brutal, though very much seasonable, heat wave that brought 100+ F temperatures for about 2 weeks. Temperatures have moderated, under cloudless sunshine, to highs in the low 90s and lows in the upper 50s. Such conditions are perfect for ripening as we enter the homestretch for the growing season, and are forecast to remain so for at least a week. Verasion was first noted in the tempranillo around July 17, and has now spread to other varietals, including barbera and primitivo. Most clusters are green in the latter varietals, but we would expect widespread verasion within the next week. Crop loads continue to appear moderate, and this has been achieved without active fruit dropping, except in the port varietals. Crop load will come into better focus, literally, with full verasion. Timing of harvest remains anyone’s guess, but we are looking for a “normal” year at this point…neither early nor late.

Our experimental hedging of barbera in certain blocks was implemented in mid-July ahead of verasion (see Vineyard Gallery photo), though the intense heat, which caused some scattered sunburn in the barbera in the absence of any leaf-thinning, made additional leaf thinning unadvisable. The hedged vines have a neat appearance, though the impact on ripening remains to be assessed. The goal is to help the vines decrease water loss through transpiration. Overall, the barbera appear to be handling the heat well with the help of irrigation, and we are hopeful that we will be successful in moderating late season sugar accumulation. On the primitivo side, the leaves have begun a yellowing process that we see annually as part of leaf senesence, though the vines have adequate leaf area for ripening and are in good balance. Berry size and grape clusters are on the small side, which we think bodes well for quality.

A cool and cloudy early-mid June gave way to seasonable temperatures, clear skies, and abundant sunshine later in the month. The extended period of mild weather should have provided ideal conditions for powdery mildew, but we’re pleased to report that we have seen no sign of it. We anticipate that regular spraying to prevent mildew will come to an end soon…one of our favorite milestones of the season.

The hot period in late June corresponded exactly with the time that our well (due to electrical and not water problems, thankfully) decided to give us spotty service, and this allowed all of our varietals to show the first sure signs of water stress, and to signal to us that they’ve exhausted the ground water from the winter. We have accordingly begun a more aggressive period of irrigation for the barbera and younger port varietals, and are only beginning to provide some irrigation to our more draught-hardy primitivo vines. Grape clusters are hanging on all the varietals at this point, and the period of major shoot growth is long past. The flexibility afforded by the mild May-June period to withhold water from the vines, coupled with well-timed mowing, has made weeds a non-issue at this point. There is no sign of verasion, and we would not expect to see it for a couple more weeks. The quantity of fruit looks modest–neither low nor high–though verasion will bring yield into better focus.

We have planned our first formal experiment to assess the impact of certain leaf and shoot thinning practices near verasion on fruit outcomes in our barbera. The barbera have proven to be water hogs and have traditionally given us a hard time late in the season keeping them adequately hydrated and with reasonable brix levels while waiting for the characteristically high acid levels to fall. While we are doing what we can proactively on the irrigation side, we’ve planned a controlled experiment to see if removal of some of the foliage from barbera can effectively slow the rate of water loss and sugar accumulation, while still allowing the fruit to ripen successfully. Selected rows within watering blocks 1 and 3 will have foliage thinned, while other rows in the same watering blocks will serve as controls. We will monitor sugar, titratable acid, and pH levels of the test and control groups through harvest.

We are looking forward to the release, we expect in the fall, of 2007 vintage primitivo and barbera wines made with Shaker Ridge grapes by the Oakstone Winery in Fairplay, CA. The 2007 primitivo scored silver medals at the El Dorado and Amador County Fairs despite being only recently bottled, whereas the barbera was not bottled in time for the competition season.

Limited quantities of primitivo grapes and our Portugese varietal grapes remain available for the 2009 harvest season.

A  quick recap of 2009 weather in the Sierra Foothills would go something like this:

• January:  dry, pleasant
• February: wet, cool
• March: dry, cool
• April:  normal rainfall, cool
• May: wet, then hot, then perfect
• June: cool, cloudy.  Cloudy?? Yes, cloudy.

Threats of an early budburst and another dry winter were allayed by the cool, rainy weather in February, which was followed by continued cool weather in March and April.  In the end, we think we netted out at close to average winter rainful, and budburst was quite delayed.  Buds in the barbera were first seen to push on March 31, with generalized budburst there and the start of budburst on the back hilltop of primitivo by the first week in April.  Even once pushed, the shoots stayed in a suspended state of animation until just after a deep rainfall in early May, at which point it was off to the races.  While the vines had a headstart, the annual grasses and clover in our vine rows–forced to go through their annual life cycle in an unusually short period of time–were not far behind.  With this sprint of the plants came that of the farmers to keep up:  near-weekly spraying to prevent mildew, shoot thinning to control crop load, mowing to control the 2-foot high grasses, and miscellaneous irrigation, fertigation, and equipment repair.   All at once. 

But as we sit here in early June, blessed wth lovely, unseasonably cool temperatures, the vineyard is relatively under control, the grasses and weeds are all but done for the year, and with further cool weather expected, we can dream of staying ahead of the irrigation this year.  Bloom is past, and the young berries are beginning to grow.

Meanwhile, on the county fair circuit, our 2007 Estate Red—consisting mainly of our first vintage of Portugese varietals blended into a dry wine–took silver medals at both the Amador and El Dorado fair homewinemaker competitions.  Obscurity Cellars’ 2007 ShakerRidge Vineyard primitivo earned silver medals in the commercial wine divisions of the same fairs.  And Oakstone’s 2006 Shaker Ridge barbera, while not entered in competitions, sold out in a few short months when made available through Oakstone’s wine club and tasting room in Fair Play.