Articles
HARVEST JOURNAL
A morsel of thought about pruning…
Pruning a vineyard isn’t hedge trimming, nor does it involve a mere systematic removal of dead wood. When the growing season begins later this spring, a biomechanical drama unfolds within each vine, culminating at harvest with the bearing of fruit.
Well, pruning sets the stage for that drama…
For the last few years, we have been looking at our vineyard with more scrutiny, discretion and care, calling in veteran viticulturists like Dr. Enrique Ferro and Marco Cavalieri for their consultation.
Together with our winemaker Gus Vizgirda, and vineyard manager Miguel Aguiar, they have been observing cyclical changes in the vineyard, taking lab samples and analyzing data in order to establish a comprehensible protocol for pruning.
The knowledge we have gained from this endeavor has been nothing less than mind-blowing, as we have begun honing in on the vines’ latent properties, and discovering what they specifically need. In addition to controlling vigor and fruit quantity, we’re now learning how best to keep our vineyard balanced and healthy, thereby improving our fruit quality.
Indeed, it’s hard to fathom that the activities in the off-season could have such a dramatic impact on the quality of the fruit and hence, the wine. But they do.
Each of the twenty three different grape varietals that we have planted here is currently being treated as its own entity and therefore has its own specific pruning methods.
This has made it particularly challenging for our vineyard workers, who must continuously change pruning strategies as they move from one block of vines to the next. But over the last for years we’ve learned that these are the steps necessary to grow the best quality grapes (and wine) possible. And we hope that you, our clientele, will be happy from the progress we’ve made each year toward making you a higher quality wine.
Cheers and la bella vita!
David Raffaele, Apprentice Winemaker
