Because conditions were not ideal for setting a big crop during bloom, we have significant shatter and loose clusters. Without the demand of a large fruit set, the vines look very lush and are thriving, with shoot tips still active. And with lower ambient temperatures, water demand is lessened as well.

So far we’ve had no real heat spikes, just a warm weekend during the second week of June. Last year at this time, we had color in the vineyard after a heat spike earlier in July. This year the weather has been similar to the 2005 growing season, but with a small crop and more shot berries like 2007. I can see slightly different timing between the various blocks and, overall, the effects of virus are not as evident as in warmer years.

I saw just a touch of color in the grapes while walking the vineyard today. As veraison occurs over the next week or so, we’ll decide just how to thin this crop. Right now we’re trimming the canopy by hand so that we can be more discriminating about each vine rather than using just one setting as a tractor makes a pass.

We haven’t applied any irrigation in our Russian River vineyard, and very little in Carneros. I’m also seeing significant lignification – that is, green canes turning to wood – and that’s a good sign that maturation is occurring. The open clusters reduce our worries of Botrytis rot and we’re also seeing very few berries pushed out by tight clusters. In all, this vintage looks very good. So far, that is. The beauty of this business is that you can never truly predict the outcome. That keeps it interesting.

A few months ago, I was pleased to participate in a seminar on terroir at the Central Coast Wine Classic in Shell Beach, California. So I got to thinking about our site, perhaps just a little more than usual.

I was privileged to manage a lot of acreage, including what is now the Donum Ranch, for many years at Buena Vista. And for the last decade, I’ve had the ability to focus on Pinot Noir at Donum, T-budding our vines over to different clones and selections to see what fares best in our blocks. As it happens, one selection from the Alexander Valley has seemed to do especially well on our property, and it has become something of the soul of Donum.

As an industry, we’ve always talked about how wines from different appellations differ — how those made from Russian River vines compare with, say, Central Coast Pinot Noirs. Of course, even wines made from the same block can be manipulated in the cellar to negate the characteristics of site. Yet it seems undeniable that, because we all work with the same assortment of rootstocks, clones and selections, and we all employ the same tools in the vineyard and the winery, the real differences derive from site.

While the Burgundians had the experience of centuries to find combinations that work well, we have in a generation assembled rootstocks, clones, trellising, spacing, water management and cultural practices – all the elements necessary to evolve into the next generation of vineyards.

To truly match plant materials to sites takes so long, and even in California, we don’t replant that often. Yet the past decade has seen Pinot Noir move ahead by leaps and bounds here because we made the major shifts necessary and we now enjoy a track record of what works.

Ten years ago at Donum, we began with one wine in mind, a blend of clones and selections. But that chorus became a duet, and sometimes a solo. We learned to pay attention, noticing what was special in the vineyard and in the cellar. Now we have several Donum Pinots, each a unique and clear expression of the marriage of clone and place.

Undoubtedly, it’s a good thing that we have a whole year to contemplate what a vintage has taught us, to try to understand the dynamics of the vineyard. In the end, we must farm with intention, with the wine we want to make in mind. We must constantly read the season and ask, where are we and what should we do? All we do in touching our 120,000 vines is predicated on caring. And while Kenneth and I may get the credit, part of our terroir is our people, the guys who actually do the work, mindfully converting our intentions into reality. Our team is an integral part of this place, and we are grateful.

The recurrent rains remind us of the 1998 vintage when it also rained periodically until June. The impression is that we’ve had a really wet spring, but the fact is that the year is pretty normal to date. While it has rained regularly, it hasn’t always rained very much. What we recall as wet days were actually periods of sprinkles to steady drizzles, more like annoying background noise.

In reality, our neutron probes reveal some depletion of moisture in the soil. That may be due to more cover crops taking up moisture because they have not been disked and worked in. Our equipment has been engaged instead in repeated applications of sulfur to prevent mildew. Because we use topical sulfur and not systemic chemicals, more rain washes it off and we have to re-apply. Fortunately, the mildew index has not been that high because temperatures have remained cool.

So, in answer to how it’s going, at this point we are behind only in our cultivation. We have done our suckering. Pinot Noir typically produces two shoots per bud, and at about the two-inch stage, we reduce that to one shoot and rub off any extra buds. Our canopies are fairly open and wires have been moved already. Now we plan to stay on top of cultivation and wait on flowering to see how we will address our crop. If the period of flowering is tight, we will thin at veraison (when grapes soften and turn color). If it’s elongated, we’ll take away weak shoots.

Last year at this time, we were almost through bloom, whereas this year bloom is from 35% to 65% completed. The nice weather last weekend helped. If it stays cool, flowering could be as late as the second week in June, as in 1998. That would put our projected harvest around late September to early October. My colleagues growing Cabernet Sauvignon or any other later ripening variety are more concerned at this moment. However, because weather can change and grapevines have their own ways of compensating, we just have to wait and see.

The key in winegrowing is to know up front what your goal is. We are making winemaking decisions in the vineyard right now by adapting to conditions with our goal firmly in mind. We have a long-term commitment to making the ultimate Pinot. So from pruning to bottling, we engage in an integrated process that requires understanding of each step. It’s not about big aha! moments, but rather an evolving body of knowledge and intuition that comes from understanding our tools and our land.

If your goal is to make sound, affordable wines, you can achieve that, but you won’t get great wines. In an overall excellent vintage like 2007, many good wines approached being great. But in more challenging vintages, you must set out to make great wine, and you have to know what you are doing and why.

As the mercury approached high 90s F., the vines had moved into full bloom. Grapevines are rather vulnerable during this period and require moderate conditions for complete pollination. Extremes of cool, hot, dry or wet weather can interrupt the process.

A good synonym for a vintage is “weather pattern.” Each growing season is a collection of fog and heat and wind and rain events. As wine grape growers, we can’t control the weather, but we do try to react to it in an appropriate manner to obtain the end product we want.

This year, as in 2007, the heat and subsequent rapid and incomplete flowering gave us little shot berries and shatter – when less than ideal conditions cause the vines not to pollinate and the flowers don’t become berries.

Within the considerable variety of Pinot Noir clones and selections in our estate vineyards, there are some variations in fruit set, but we’re seeing lots of loose clusters and small berries. The combination of large and small berries in our Old Wente selection of Chardonnay is often referred to as “hens and chicks” or even “pumpkins and peas.” It’s said that there may be a fertility issue in Old Wente with zinc as a player, but we find micronutrients are generally not a concern.

At any rate, if we were only concerned with yields, with crop tonnage, shatter might be a big negative, but instead we are excited. As in 2007, this could be the making of an excellent vintage quality-wise. Loose clusters and small berries can translate into more even ripeness, a low probability of rot due to increased air flow, and higher skin-to-pulp ratios in the berries which concentrates flavors and aromas.

Most of June was mild and uneventful with a small heat spike at the end, and July has been similar, although we have had high 90s during this past week. Our relative humidity has been good as well.

Ten days ago as I walked the vineyards, I saw no signs of virus showing. A few days ago after some heat stress, it began to show up. I’ve also seen the first signs of color (veraison), but it’s less than one percent of the crop. It will be interesting to keep track of how many days it takes to reach 25%, 50% and 90+%.

With more humidity this year, we’ve seen higher mildew pressure. I have quite a bit in the roses around my house and they are always a good indicator. Chardonnay is particularly sensitive, so we made sure to have our canopies opened up for air circulation by the 4th of July weekend. We pulled leaves early and the fruit looks clean. It’s funny, today when we talk of quality, we don’t even think about clean fruit. It has become the standard.

I mentioned earlier the actions growers can take. Our primary tool of control is water. On the technical side, we have great tools to aid us in irrigating. We measure leaf water potential (LWP) by seeing how much pressure it takes to push the water from a leaf out through its stalk, the petiole. This reading is much like taking someone’s blood pressure or measuring blood sugar. It’s a snapshot of water content in the plant.

We combine that information with a measure of soil moisture levels – the amount of water available to our vines. The neutron probe is a remarkable instrument that emits neutrons that lose energy when they impact hydrogen atoms in water. A neutron detector indicates weaker responses to neutrons as soil water content increases. We take these measurements weekly.

Recently, our leaf water pressure numbers were running higher than we’d like and they didn’t correlate with the soil moisture numbers or my visual observations of the vines. It just didn’t make sense to me. We had more than adequate moisture in the ground, and temperatures were moderate, yet we were getting LWP readings of 12 to 13 bars. We generally don’t want any higher than ten, and I had expected a reading of between seven and nine bars.

I’ve run into similar situations in the past. In 1999, for example, our sugar sample numbers just flatlined and that didn’t make sense. The numbers need to tell a story. They should not become the story. If the story doesn’t make sense, you have to be alert and apply your experience. While technology and numbers are marvelous tools, you can’t rely on them blindly.

What we discovered was that our LWP machine was reading two to three bars higher than it should have. We borrowed another one to compare readings, and the numbers of the two machines varied by two to three bars.  The readings of the borrowed machine were in line with the visual state of the vine and the soil moisture level.  We have had our machine recalibrated. Luckily, we didn’t over-irrigate (although I would prefer to put on too much water rather than too little because once the plants are stressed, it’s hard to get them back to functioning well again).

We are fortunate to be able to factor in leaf water potential and soil moisture levels with vine transpiration needs and the weather forecast to make our use of water as a tool more precise. But this little incident illustrates that, despite our technology, perhaps our best tool is referred to in the old adage of the grower’s footprints in the vineyard.

You overlay years of experience with the site and the clones and you increase your understanding of what works when and where. Experience is the ultimate tool.

We find their experience, expertise and the perspectives they bring very stimulating. Part of their role is to challenge us to continue to think creatively. One pitfall we try to guard against is falling into the same old ruts in our thinking and planning. Good enough is simply not good enough in the pursuit of the ultimate.

As we began our conversation, Phil commented on the smoke-filled skies from the many California wildfires during the past two months and the question of smoke affecting this year’s grape crop, a topic of some concern in our industry of late.  People have speculated that photosynthesis may have been impeded, or that grapes, and thus wines made from them, may be “smoke tainted.”

Phil doubts that smoke will be an issue. In the first instance, he doesn’t feel that smoke and particulate matter are sunshine issues, that they shield vines from photosynthetic radiation. He points out that vines function differently under cloudy skies as opposed to in the shade (much as humans can be sunburned on a cloudy day, but not in full shade), and the smoky conditions are comparable to cloud cover.

To get smoke into the fruit, he said that fires would have to burn for some time right next to a post-veraison (after grapes soften and turn color) red wine grape vineyard. (There would be no problem with white grapes because generally the juice is quickly removed from the skins in winemaking.)

Smoke dissolves in the waxy cuticle on the skin of the grape berry, and most of it is not water soluble in juice. As alcohol levels rise in the fermenter, however, the combination of alcohol and heat can suddenly produce a smoked sausage aroma in the winery from smoke-affected fruit.

Phil has witnessed such results from smoke in South Africa, Australia and California. He reminded us of the 1981 harvest in east Napa when several Cabernet Sauvignon vineyards, a couple of Zinfandel vineyards and a Merlot vineyard were subjected to fires in close proximity and yielded tainted wines.

The Australians have the most experience with fires, he said. They have farmed essentially under drought conditions for a decade or more, with late season fires occurring in 2003 as well as during the past three vintages, 2006-08.

Because the smoke we encountered occurred at high levels and also mostly before the onset of veraison, he feels it’s a non-issue.

Speaking of veraison, we received an interesting comment on our last post from Amel Salvatierra, who asked what effect on development and final character the heat spike had on berries that were pushed to change color.

I can’t list the exact effects, but I know that those berries will be a little riper. We’re only talking a few percent of berries here – the extreme right (ripe!) side of the bell curve, if you will. We always get excited when we see that first color because it means we’re moving to another stage.

We strive for uniformity in our crop – the huge center section of that bell curve – and we thin to avoid the other, greener extreme. But in actuality you can always find a range of several degrees Brix within the harvest from a given vineyard, block, row or even vine. The final Brix may be a precise reading, but it’s an average.

Anyway, those early berries may be a little riper, but overall they constitute a small component and don’t have much effect on the resultant wine.

A week ago I walked our Nugent (Russian River Valley), Donum and Ferguson Block vineyards. It had been four weeks since the July heat spike when we saw that first color in the grapes. Then cool weather returned and the vines stalled. Around July 28th, everything moved again very swiftly. Within three days, we had 50% veraison or better in most of our blocks. And now we have full color. It all happened within a week to ten days.

So now I’m estimating that harvest will occur the second week of September. How do we calculate that? Well, the classic interval in our industry between bloom and harvest is considered to be 100 days.

But in our cool climate vineyards, normally (whatever that is) our harvest occurs 112 to 115 days from the date that we have 50% bloom. Another check after the fact is to count back from harvest 35 days, which should put you at 50% veraison. Again, in our cool climate, that interval is more like 45 days. And for the last three vintages, we have experienced long hang times that extended that period to as much as 55 days.

This process of prediction involves rules of thumb and not absolutes, and is tempered by experience and intuition. Since we had 50% veraison at the end of July, right now I’m predicting that we should start harvest 45 days later, the second week of September. Does that sound like smoke and mirrors? Well, that’s the fun of it. We’ll plan for it, then wait and see.

Fires continued to burn around the state of California, and the polluted air combined with the heat wave made working outside seem like standing in front of a blow dryer.

Just north of Sonoma on the Fourth of July, a hillside grass fire started with a spark from a mower and threatened residences as well as Hanzell Winery. Thanks to the swift response of firefighters, fixed-wing aircraft dropping slurry and a helicopter dropping water, the fire was put out after burning only seven acres with no harm done to homes, winery or venerable vineyards.

Remarkably, with all this heat in a dry year, our vineyards are not showing stress. There’s hardly any sunburn on the fruit. There’s some virus showing up, but water pressure is ok. As cooler weather returned last week, the vines just cruised along.

This somewhat surprising lack of effects from extreme weather could be due to the light crop load this year created by the frost. I estimate that our yields will be at least 20% less than normal, and that will mean a short crop for the second year in a row.  Given the state of the economy, if we’re going to have short years, this would be the time.

Another positive factor for the vines is that the humidity did not get super low. It just dipped below the 30% range. When it gets really low, that just sucks moisture out of the vines.

One effect of the July heat was to push grapes into color  – especially the Calera and Martini Pinot Noir selections – about three weeks early. Our old Martini in the Ferguson Block showed up to 15% color, but then didn’t move any further along last week. We expect 50% veraison (when grapes soften and change color) in the first week of August.

I don’t think this will be a late year. The last three vintages have seen slow ripening with lots of hang time. The 2008 growing season reminds me more of 2003 and 2004 when we cruised right into harvest. But you never know for sure with the weather.

I’ve been paying particular attention to berry counts – berries per cluster, undersized berries and shot berries. I’ve noticed there are not a lot of wings hanging off the side of the main clusters. That’s a plus for quality, because the berries on the wings often ripen later. That can have a significant effect, because while the main cluster may contain from 100 to 120 berries, the wings carry 40 to 50.

My berry count is more anecdotal than scientific, but it gives me a feel for the vintage. The heat that pushed the vines through bloom rapidly produced some shot berries – non-fertilized grapes. There are also a considerable number of under-sized berries that were fertilized but did not size up fully. I estimate the total of smaller berries at about one-third. Again, that can be a plus in terms of preventing rot because the clusters are looser and air can circulate.

It’s cool now, but a week ago we had four days of 100-degree temperatures. That’s our third heat spike in what has been a fairly cool, windy and very dry season to date. We also had spikes in mid-May and early June, and this succession of heat events reminds me of the 2003 and 2004 vintages.

That said, the vineyards are showing nicely. We use two tools to monitor our water situation and evaluate the effectiveness of irrigations. The neutron probe tells us the levels of moisture stored in the soil. The pressure bomb, which we’ve had as an in-house tool since the 2002 vintage, gives us leaf water pressure, a snapshot of the water situation in the plant.

Of course, the data has to be interpreted. For example, these hot days have about a “two-bar” effect on our readings. Whereas the leaf water pressure might read 9 or 10 bars on a cooler day, a hot day will generate a pressure reading of 11 or 12, which would normally indicate considerable stress. So you have to consider the reading in context.

We did put on a little water given the natural increase in demand during hotter days. But the vines have cruised through beautifully. Shoot tips look good and canopies are holding up. Because of the frost and cool weather early in the season, we’ve had extra steps in manipulating the canopies, moving wires for slower shoot growth. At this point, we are positioning shoots and opening the canopies to light and air.

In terms of crop size, we are seeing less quantity but more open clusters, an indicator for high quality that means better color development in the berries. We’re seeing some shot berries in the Martini and Calera selections, more than in the Dijon clones. In general, the crop is looking very good.

Last month we looked at petiole (the stalk that joins a leaf to a stem) analyses. Each year at bloom time, we examine this part of the plant to determine nutritional status. This gives us a snapshot in time, and we also create a history so that we can compare readings year by year. The University of California at Davis has developed some good average values to help us interpret our data.

We look at the macro-nutrients – the NPK or nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium known to every home gardener. Nitrogen stimulates green growth, phosphorus affects fertility and fruitfulness, and potassium helps ripen fruit by affecting the transportation of carbohydrates. We also consider various micro-nutrients like iron, zinc, boron, manganese and magnesium, which also play key roles in the functions of the grapevine.

For the past few years, we’ve had slightly lower phosphorus values, but those have come up. We’re looking for any red flag so that we can correct the situation before veraison (when berries soften and turn color) to make nutrients available to the plant and enable it to perform properly. And right now, our vines seem to be doing just that.

Shatter can be the result of too much heat or wind or moisture during bloom that prevents the setting of fruit. Timing is everything, as different sites, clones or selections and varieties develop at different rates. We expected some shatter with the onset of heat last month around bloom time as all the pent-up energy stored in the vines during the cool weather was unleashed in a growth spurt. We see elongated rachises (grape cluster axes) as a result of that spurt.

A little shatter is good for quality because it opens up the cluster, allowing berries to size up and air to circulate, promoting even ripening and preventing rot. Now I’m waiting on berry counts for the different clones and selections, and then we can speculate on potential yields.

On Tuesday, I attended a seminar on viruses at the University of California at Davis. In the old days, conventional wisdom said that virus was spread by propagation and you either had it in dirty rootstock or got it from new plant material, in infected scion wood. Now we know that it can be spread by soft-bodied insects like the grape mealy bug, so we assume scale and white flies can carry it, too. We’re still uncertain as to whether phylloxera can spread it.

In the old days, it’s possible that heavier pesticide use and broader spectrum materials may have kept mealy bugs in check. It may be that newer rootstocks tend to express viruses more as well. Now we realize that viruses can jump rows and get into a clean vineyard from a neighboring vineyard, and there isn’t much you can do about it.

One way to approach it would be to obtain clean plant material together with your neighbor. Each grower will have to assess their situation and determine what is economical for them. Viruses delay ripening, lower yields and lessen color although they can also raise acidity and perhaps add flavor complexities.

The beauty of our industry is that it’s so democratic. We face challenges together and so we are forced to work together to meet them.

Monday, May 5th:
Today Nabor and I stood in a low bowl on The Donum Estate and took in the vineyard landscape. He observed that while cold air normally flows in from the north, it came instead from the south during our recent frost, flowing like water and reaching a fairly high level in this bowl. Once it hit the hillsides, the cold air had nowhere to go but up.

Normally we see differences between vines up on ridges and those down in the swales. Water drains from the ridgelines quickly, and due to their elevation and exposure, vines up there are in warmer as well as drier conditions. But with something like 30 nights of cold weather this spring, the variation is more pronounced. The bowl was affected by continual cold air as well as by two nights of frost.

As we looked around, the vineyard reminded me of the visual effects of flood waters. We could see a frost line. Nabor pointed out that even on individual vines, lower points were damaged while higher points were unaffected. We saw considerable variation in shoot maturity on single vines, and that can be problematic. We can only hope that the vine will compensate and even out its maturation as the season progresses.

Even vineyards with wind machines or overhead sprinkler irrigation for frost protection had problems this year. During the last frost, we had wind machines go on at 11 pm and run until after 6 in the morning. In one instance, the temperature dropped so fast that the gas apparently froze in the line, and the little computer on the wind machine displayed a “help” message.

The fans on wind machines are usually at a height of 40 feet so that they can move air from a warmer layer down to ground level. This time the air was so cold that the fans just moved more cold air.

Usually sprinklers provide the best protection, but not if they run out of water, and some growers have used up their water supply. Micro-sprinklers have such a low flow rate that those lines also froze.

Most of our blocks have cane-pruned vines, which are more flexible, but some say they were hit harder than cordon-pruned vines. With severe cold, the sap recedes. Alternating cold and warm weather can also put the vine in shock. Nabor cut a cane where the shoots were withered, and it was dry. Then he cut a sucker off of the same vine’s trunk and it bled sap. We’re sure the trunks and roots are ok.

We’ll keep shoots even though they appear to be too far behind, because we want to leave growing points and keep the vine in balance. I don’t want to create a few huge canes. We don’t want to rub off damaged buds because they contain back-up systems; there’s still something there that wants to push.

We drove maybe 150 feet to the top of a ridge, and the vines on the crest were really green. Over that short distance, it’s as if we had moved ahead a month in development. In this nice weather, these vines are moving nicely and are close to flowering. I expect bloom in the next two weeks.

Many of our blocks look good. We’re ok and we’re coming back. I expect we’ll get as high as ten clusters (about two pounds) per vine, and that translates to about one ton per acre for those vines with frost damage, whereas undamaged vines normally would produce four to five pounds per vine.

As we looked around from atop the ridge, we saw a lot of green. To a grower, green means growth and that means hope. Nabor said we have to recharge our mentalities. He told me his new computer password is “hope.”

Friday, May 16th:
We’ve had three very warm days in a row with temperatures from 99 to 102 degrees F. The nights have been very warm with a hot wind blowing. Suddenly we are seeing an explosion of shoot growth and the internodes (distance on a shoot between nodes or areas where lateral shoots develop) are extended. It’s as if the vines are on steroids.

In Carneros, the Martini Pinot Noir selection is farthest along in flowering. Lots of calyptra (little caps of fused petals) have come off. Flowering may have been too fast and could affect fruit set. We’ll see.

Our 290 and 390 blocks, hit by frost, are still behind but catching up. Even where there was no frost but the vineyards were cooler longer – in the swales and flats – there is diminished growth, but they are gaining on the vines on the ridges. Overall, the vines are not as uneven as we had expected. If flowering moves along quickly, we’ll see how much the vines have evened out by veraison (when grapes soften and turn color).

We had a dry spring and our probes showed that the soil profile was pretty empty, so we put on water. We’re glad we did, because this heat has not stressed the vines. We have enough water, and we’ll need to stay on top of that situation this year.

I walked the vineyards early today. It was a gorgeous morning with the light playing on the rolling hills and a hot air balloon drifting by. The vineyards look healthy, and I feel very positive. Green is back!

Friday, May 30th:
I visited our Russian River Valley vineyard on Wednesday. The vines looked good – everything has come back since the frosts. We may just get growth and not a lot of crop from secondary buds that pushed out after the primaries were damaged. We’ll see.

Both there and in Carneros, the brief heat spell in mid-May tightened the period of flowering. Within a week, we went from 5% to 100% bloom. I walked our Donum Estate vineyards on Tuesday, and I observed that flowering is finished and the grapes are starting to set. Lateral shoots are pushing out and the vines are moving to the wires. Again, it will be hard to say what we have in terms of crop until the berries size up.

The cool Memorial Day weekend, which included a few hours of modest rainfall on Saturday, has persisted through this week as cloudy mornings are followed by sunny afternoons. As we see more green, we also see less unevenness, and that remains cause for us to be positive.

It doesn’t always happen. We may not get a flavor shift in the vineyard, but then it will eventually come out in the wine. Or we can have beautiful ripe fruit flavors, but the skins are still green.

Last year we had flavors appear early, disappear and then reappear. We really don’t have that much experience with long hang time. Kenneth probably has more from his winemaking in Oregon.

Because our moderate weather has persisted, the question is, if you don’t really need to pick, at what point do you cease to gain anything? For many growers, this stage would be perfectly fine – the fruit is ripe and sound, so bring it in. But we want it all. We want the peak of flavor and ripeness, and we know that once you take it off, you can’t put the fruit back on the vine.

If we were facing a big heat spike or serious rain coming in, there’s no question we would pick right now. But with nothing to fear, can we get more evolved and concentrated fruit by waiting? It’s a nice dilemma to have.

We are in the vineyards every day, walking, sampling, feeling and tasting the fruit. In one of our Donum blocks, we are waiting for the skins to start breaking down so that the pulp comes away from them. A little rain could actually help that breakdown. The Japanese have a wonderful term for the moment when a rose is perfectly open, just on the verge of the petals falling. Or it’s like anticipating that moment when you perfectly brown the sugar of a crème brûlée.

As I look back on the growing season, flowering began early, but it was really drawn out. We had 20% to 30% bloom in the first week of May, then it cooled off and we only had between 50% and 90% by the end of May. That pushed the harvest back. Veraison (when grapes soften, turn color) was also drawn out. Some berries were ahead of others within the cluster; berry-by-berry sampling showed that variation. But now the later berries are catching up and the others aren’t dehydrating. So we’re getting uniform ripeness at last.

We know that the leaves in our canopies are old now. They certainly are not operating at full blast, but we hope there is still significant photosynthesis occurring. On the other hand, sugars are flat-lining. We have been sitting at 23 to 24 degrees Brix (approximate percentage of sugar) since early September now. There is not much dehydration, so we aren’t getting a bump in sugar that way. Even the little shot berries are juicy. The skins are just gorgeous, so we may have virtually complete ripeness at lower sugars, and we may make a different kind of wine from this vintage.

We’ll pick Ferguson Block tomorrow and finish Donum next week.

As a grower, I’m not so happy about lighter crop weight, but as a winemaker, Kenneth is excited because there will be a higher skin-to-juice ratio yielding more intensity. Shot berries can add to quality as long as it doesn’t get too hot in the vineyard. There have been no major heat spikes this year so far, just a couple of days in the high 90’s.

The vines are growing nicely. Without any rainfall, there aren’t huge canopies, and because the crop level is slightly low, it should come in more quickly.

The old California sprawl system of trellising (two wires on a cross-arm) gave us more leaf canopy and so was more forgiving, but not fine-tuned for quality. Now we all have movable vertical trellises, 48 inches high, and we’re more precise in the number of leaves – often we have eight canes with eight shoots per side, for 16 shoots total or less — so we really need to keep them functioning to have enough leaf surface to ripen the fruit. In this third week of June, we’re starting to see veraison (softening, coloring of berries) and the vineyards look just great.

Last year we had good weather during bloom and the flowering resulted in both big berry size and berry numbers, so cluster weights were heavy. This year we had an “o.k.” set, but we’re seeing “hens and chicks” – large and small berries within the same cluster. These clusters are more open, allowing more air flow, and they are lighter, so the small berries reduce yields, but they also should increase flavor concentration, which could make the 2007 vintage more promising from a winemaking perspective.