Thursday, April 10th:
We’ve had a cold spring with some serious frost at the very end of March when temperatures were below freezing for five hours and got as low as 26 degrees F.
Because frost damage can cause unevenness in growth and ripening, it complicates our decision-making. If we’ve lost some crop already, for example, should we thin more crop?

Luckily, Pinot Noir is a later variety and a lot of our vines hadn’t pushed out yet. Our Carneros topography of rolling hills was helpful, because those vines that were out up to two inches were in upper blocks, while the cold air, being heavier, flows into the low swales in the vineyards. Also, our vines are mostly cane pruned, so the secondary buds might be more fruitful and hopefully could make up most of the loss if the primary buds are damaged.

It got really cold and we don’t really understand yet what happened. Could the low temperatures have affected flow in the xylem, the tissue in the trunk that conducts water and dissolved nutrients up to the buds? We only have to deal with frost about one out of every four or five years, so we don’t have the extensive experience they do in Washington, for instance.

Normally we would sucker early, but now we are reluctant to rub off an extra bud when we may need it later. This situation forces you to be creative.

It’s really too early to tell, but I’d estimate loss in Carneros at five to ten percent, whereas in our Russian River Valley vineyard, it might be as high as 20%. We’ll see at flowering how even things are.

Thursday, April 17th:
We walked the vineyards again yesterday. There was one block in the flats that may have lost up to 10%, but everywhere else looked pretty good. We had a very warm weekend, up into the low 90’s, then cold again with another frost alert night on Monday. These extremes are not good.

We have been waiting, too gun shy to sucker, and we don’t like being timid. We want to move ahead with our work. What’s happening out there is a moving, shifting equation, and we have to try to understand the dynamic before acting. We have done all of our replanting and cultivation. The ground is really nice, and we have enough water, although it’s been dry since February.

We noticed that fruitfulness is good this year. We are seeing two and sometimes even three clusters per shoot, and wings on the clusters. So we have made our decision - we’ll begin suckering on Monday.

Monday, April 28th:
We had another severe frost for several nights over last weekend (April 19-21). We were hit hard for the second time on The Donum Estate in blocks 290 and 390, and the fruit is gone. We’ll be training canes for next year there. We estimate our loss at 30 tons of Pinot Noir, about 20% of the yield of the entire estate. In 290, we probably lost 10% of our Chardonnay.

In our Russian River Valley vineyard, the one-two punch did extensive damage where we’ve never had damage previously. A lot of secondary buds had pushed out after the first frost and they were fried. More buds that we thought were pushing are now dried out and not coming.

There have been so many nights with frost alarms this year. Normally we might have four or five cold nights, but this year we’ve probably had 25 over the past two months. People are running out of water. In areas where frost is not common, like our Russian River and Carneros vineyards, often vines have no protection. Where frost occurs more frequently, either wind machines or overhead sprinklers are used. Heavier cold air settles next to the ground, so the wind machines displace it and circulate warmer air from above to prevent freezing. Applying layer after layer of water also protects the tender shoots by constant freezing that, ironically, releases heat to prevent tissue damage.

We have gone from a normal, very promising year to a frost and now a terrible double frost. So far, this second frost is the defining moment of the 2008 vintage. A decade from now, this year may be referred to as the bad frost year. It’s an interesting vintage, and it drives home the fact that you cannot control nature. It’s a weather issue now, but it will affect wine quantity and pricing down the line. We’ll continue to track the impact in future posts.

That beer sparked a discussion of wine styles. My friend had recently tasted a 1987 Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon from a prominent producer. The wine had aged quite nicely. Upon opening, it displayed considerable green pepper and green olive aromas as well as a slight herbal character in the flavors, but he said those components gradually diminished to mere hints as the wine revealed more currant and cassis. The label showed the alcohol at 12.5% (a popular level for its era), and while he recalled 1987 as a big, warm vintage, he found nothing in the wine to dispute that figure. The wine was very pleasant but subtle, he said, with no big “wow” factor.

My friend has been an avid wine consumer for three decades, so he recognized those “green’ aromas and flavors as appropriate for Cabernet Sauvignon. Yet he was surprised to encounter them. We have shifted our paradigm in California, away from pyrazine, that “green” compound in red grapes.

If we consider the range from obscenely green to slightly vegetal to perfectly ripe to over-the-top, as an industry we’d rather be over-the-top than green (not to be confused with environmentally conscious). In 1987, I suspect the focus was on who was getting the ripest fruit. Now that everyone strives for and most achieve ripeness, if not over-ripeness, I consider the best producers those who can attain a perfectly balanced ripeness.

My friend asked me how many producers do that consistently, and I had to say maybe half a dozen produce the style that I prefer. He persisted, wondering if they were smaller producers, and most of them are. Then he wanted to know if my wines were among those I chose.

Good question. A winemaker’s style is a combination of variables coming together to produce a recognizable signature. Most of the time, you know that’s your wine, even if sometimes you’re not exactly sure why or how. For me, experiencing my own wine is like being unable to see the forest because you’re so familiar with each of the trees.

Even if I’ve just nailed the wine, it’s not as easy to love as someone else’s wine. There’s a joy of discovery in finding a wine somebody else nailed. How did she do that? Speculating on the reasons for another winemaker’s success is the best part. Learning - solving the puzzle - is fun. I suppose thinking about my own wine is like looking at a crossword puzzle that I’ve already filled in.

My friend tasted my beer and agreed with me. He said it was “too” smooth, slightly cloying. He loves Pinot Noirs - he’s had the iron fist in the velvet glove experience - so he asked about texture.

I told him I think texture is all about farming and then not abusing the fruit in the cellar. It’s a function of a mature vineyard in balance with a proper canopy and crop load that produces depth of fruit. You bring it in at the proper moment and you treat it gently. It’s amazing how much you can and should beat Cabernet Sauvignon to death and how fragile Pinot Noir is.

Extended contact with the lees is huge. I’m sensitive to texture when making the wine. I taste it frequently, and if it’s getting a little rough around the edges, I pull back, ease off on the extraction. If it’s not enough, I move forward.

As he pushed my beer back to me, my friend asked if I thought high-end Pinot producers sometimes had residual sugar in their wines. I think there’s probably a little r.s. in quite a few. I don’t consider that cheating. I’m a big believer in the juice, and if the wine didn’t finish quite dry, who cares as long as it isn’t problematic. If it’s not cloying, is it good? Does the end result give the most pleasure?

As new consumers and new winemakers, we often get hung up on picking out a flaw. Someone once pointed out that a great vintage of Haut Brion had some Brettanomyces, volatile acidity and residual sugar. Yet the sum of the parts was extraordinary.

I know with my own wines, I have stopped looking at numbers. I do look at them when the fruit comes in for any possible adjustments, but after that I taste the wine. I really don’t care what the final numbers are. It all comes down to that moment of anticipation when you raise the glass to your lips. Is it in the glass? And, yes, it does take at least some good beer to make good wine.

It is St. Patrick’s Day and, appropriately, there is green everywhere. We had some rain this weekend and a cold front moved in behind it, so frost season is upon us as well, for as long as the next two months.

We have finished pruning and tying the vines, and this is the time of year when we can assess the potential of the vineyards. When the vines are tied, we truly feel that a new vintage has begun because we no longer see unpruned canes as evidence of 2007. Everything is in good order. The canes look very good, soils are nicely saturated and cover crops have prevented erosion.

We have bottled the 2006 Pinots as well as our 2007 Rosé, first wine of that vintage. The 2007 Pinots are almost all through with malolactic fermentations, and barrel orders have gone in for 2008.

Walking through the vineyard, we’ve seen lots of bud swelling in Chardonnay, which is typically ahead of Pinot Noir in activity. We have a couple of weeks to repair trellises or replant missing vines before suckering. After the vines push out at bud break, we cultivate and then we do early suckering when they reach two inches. Pinot Noir usually produces two shoots per bud and we bring that down to one. It’s a wonderful practice that sets up the canopy and determines the caliber of the canes.

At this time of year, we have a little time to do some interesting things. Recently we conducted a blind tasting of relatively high-end Chardonnays. The style seems to be shifting away from the heavily oaked, heavy handed wines of the 1990’s toward crisper, more food friendly offerings with lemony, minerally fruit.

This is also a time to travel. A week ago I poured at the World of Pinot Noir in Shell Beach, California. It was a wonderful tasting, right on the ocean and completely sold out. I poured 2004 and 2005, and there were quite a few 2006 wines there as well.

One attendee pointed out to me that when you taste so many Pinots, the 2005s, including ours, stick out as showy wines with big shoulders. That’s similar to what tends to happen in wine competitions or comparative tastings – the bigger statements capture the attention. I must say that I would probably choose our 2004 vintage to accompany dinner, however, because it is showing such elegance and finesse.

It was fun to see a number of excellent high-end producers like Martinelli pouring. I didn’t get out from behind our table much, but I saw Talisman showing four or five of their wines, and Kosta Brown offering several different vineyard designates for tasting.

At recent tastings, as the afternoon goes by, I have taken to putting my Pinot Noir on ice. Warm wine doesn’t show as well, and it’s not just that the alcohol is move evident. The wine becomes a little disconnected. As in restaurants, I’d rather have the wine a little too cool than too warm. Otherwise, it’s like drinking warm beer.

As for travel, I’m on my way to Germany to pour our wine at Prowein in Dusseldorf and to speak at a seminar before spending Easter with my mom.

The vines look relaxed, in great shape for bud break. They have more energy this year, which makes sense following a smaller crop in 2007. And they need the water. Although they are dormant, a cold, dry winter can prove stressful for vines.

Anne and I were talking yesterday, and I told her that this is my 24th vintage. I know enough, but not everything. My job is interesting because it’s a constant learning experience.

I play a game with myself, like a football coach. I don’t focus on the end of the game. Instead, I try to concentrate on it play by play - a five-yard run here, getting into field goal position there. Yes, I have an idea of what a whole vintage might bring, but right now I’m concentrating totally on pruning, and next week, on tying the canes to trellis wires.

As I look back over 24 years, I realize there are many more people making wine now. Many have gone to school and are good at putting the numbers together. In the old days, people made wine more with intuition and talent, but the results were more vintage dependent because they had fewer tools to work with. Today, I think there may be fewer people with talent in our industry. But those who are both well-educated and talented — they are exceptional. Talent also has a lot to do with passion for your work.

Our job in the vineyard is to create components for great wine - the proper tannins, acid, sugar and fruit flavors and aromas. If it is necessary to manipulate the wines in the winery to make up for deficiencies from the vineyard, the wine will be inferior.

Kenneth is very involved with the vineyard. When he began here as winemaker, he was on the bench. He became a good player, then a team leader, and now he’s helping to coach the team. He is very confident in his decisions. I joked with him never to believe he’s the owner, because in football they may have power, but they may not know all they need to.

I watch Kenneth walk the vineyards. He knows what he needs and what he’s looking for, and he has developed intuition. He gets a lot of information from the grapes, and that’s good for our team.

Kenneth really starts getting involved around veraison (when grapes soften and change color). Then he’s like a chef at the farmer’s market or the fish market - he wants to know everything about his raw material. If a chef has the finest ingredients, he has to do very little, but he has to know exactly what to do. I think that’s the role of the winemaker with outstanding grapes.

My position is to make sure both Anne and Kenneth have all the information from the vineyard that they need. The better the information I provide, the more success we will have. Everything in the vineyard system is connected - fog, humidity, temperature, soil moisture, wind. If you are calm, you see it all. So you take it all in, digest it and present your interpretation. Accurate, honest information leads to trust and that eventually makes good wine. Over the years, Anne and I have learned to speak precisely the same language.

So I need to get my hands and boots dirty, be aware, gather information and stay connected with my team. It’s a discipline, a way you live. Larry Hyde taught me to pay attention. I try to teach guys who are learning to ask themselves, why am I cutting? What will this mean?

When you pay attention, you see so much more. And you become aware of the consequences of your actions. When you are pruning one vine, it hardly seems to matter if you make two cuts or four cuts. But when you prune a thousand vines, that’s two thousand additional cuts.

Recently I replaced my water heater, so I had to solder copper pipe. I had never done that before, and that’s a helpless feeling. When I asked the experts, they told me it was easy - yes, for them! That experience was good for me, because it made me more compassionate with the guys who are still learning. And we’re all still learning.

Heavy rains have brought us close to 20 inches for the season, very near normal, which is slightly less than 22 through this month. By comparison, last year we had just over 11 inches to date.

I have been sidelined with the flu, which has seemed ironic during this past week of warm, sunny days. Nabor has been busy in the vineyard, and with dry weather forecast, he should finish pruning our home ranch, The Donum Estate, and nearby Ferguson Block by early next week. Then we start tying.

I’m on the mend, so we’ll head up to Nugent Vineyards next Saturday and start there. The vines are still dormant. Nothing really happens until soil temperatures reach 50 degrees F., the magic number when the “sap rises.” Nothing in the vineyard is swelling, but I’ve seen a few trees starting to push.

The first half of February is pretty early for this kind of weather. We try to postpone pruning as long as possible because that delays bud break and lessens the chance of frost damage. The rains have given us nice cover crops, which, in turn, absorb the rainfall so that there isn’t much standing water. But Nabor and his team aren’t daunted by mud.

The cellar is buttoned up and Kenneth just left with his family for a well-deserved vacation in Mexico, near Cancun. Some wines are still finishing ML, or malolactic fermentation (conversion of stronger malic acid, found in apples, to weaker lactic acid, found in milk). While this winter has been moderate overall, there have been cold periods. Our late harvest put winemaking on a later schedule, including moving ML, which is temperature driven, into the colder months, further slowing it. But everything is proceeding nicely within an acceptable time frame.

Valentine’s Day is associated with the color red, but in the vineyards, there is a riot of yellow with the mustard out in abundance. I feel better just looking at it.

KJ: In 2006, we started analyzing different grape and wine samples, sending them to the lab to run the values of different types of tannins, like catechins, found in seeds, and anthocyanins, or pigments.

First, we just wanted to establish baseline values - where we were. Our goal was to find out what our personal sweet spots are, in terms of what we consider to be great wine, and determine if there are corresponding tannin sweet spots. So we took a quantitative look at tannins.

AMR: We looked at both vineyard and winery practices to see if, first, we could manipulate the tannin numbers and second, if we liked the wines at higher tannin levels. So we had three different vineyard thinning trials in adjacent rows last year, as we have alluded in previous posts.

First, we had our standard farming practice, which we call “by eye” thinning. We thin fruit so that the canopy is open and in balance and every cluster has its space. Next, we also alternated one and two clusters per shoot - one-two-one-two - which we called “1-1/2.” Third, we thinned to one cluster per shoot.

In each case, we cut fruit back and we experienced different yields.

KJ: The trial was ideal in that all three pruning approaches yielded about the same overall volume (not the same yield per vine, but we had anticipated that) and all three wines were made identically.

With other blocks, we worked with different saigneé (”bleeding off” or removing a small amount of juice to concentrate the must) levels of 0%, 5% and 10% to compare the effect on tannin levels.

Everything came out textbook, as expected. Lower yields produced higher tannins. The higher the percentage of saigneé, the higher the tannins were as well.

AMR: In the tasting, there were between 25 and 30 lots divided into four flights and tasted completely blind. No one knew anything about the wines except that they were our 2007 Pinots.

In one flight consisting of six wine lots, the person setting up the tasting made sure that wines from our vineyard trials were all in that flight together - three out of the six wines. Those of us tasting had no idea which of the four flights they were in. We rated each wine on a ten-point scale, with ten as the highest score.

In general, the scores were very close. The three wines in the vineyard trial scored almost right on top of each other, within a point or two. But the least manipulated wine - the standard “by eye” thinning - was the favorite.

KJ: And the wine with no saigneé was also the favorite. It seemed to be lighter and prettier, whereas those which had been manipulated seemed bigger, but tight and brooding, holding onto their esters and perfume. The winemaking trials produced wider gaps in scoring; the wine made with the 667 Dijon Pinot Noir clone from Nugent Vineyards in the Russian River Valley scored 45 points without a saigneé, and 35 points with 10%.

AMR: It’s interesting to note that our 490 block, which always gives us a major component of our Donum Carneros Estate Pinot, naturally tends toward one cluster per shoot. Because it’s cordon-pruned (vine has long, permanent horizontal arms with multiple spurs), the buds are more shaded and not as fruitful. Because only the first two buds are left per spur after pruning, they develop early but receive less light and heat, so they tend to be more vegetative and less fruitful. In Burgundy, growers often rub off those first buds.

That’s why cane pruning is usually preferred in cool climate areas, because the pruning can be varied. You can adjust and choose the buds you want. Pinot Noir tends to push more than one shoot per bud. With cane-pruned vines, you get more growing points and can eliminate weaker shoots by suckering early in the season to put all the vine’s energy into the remaining shoots.

That said, we leave 490 on the cordon because it naturally produces smaller yields and intense fruit, so we don’t want to mess with it. Ironically, with yields in most blocks down last year, 490 was pretty normal, probably because it flowered better.

The point of all this is that 490 has some of the highest tannin levels of all our lots and it was one of the highest rated lots in the tasting.

KJ: So in this first blind tasting of 2007s, people usually liked the control wines, which were less manipulated.

AM: Yes, they were made in our usual way in the vineyard and seemed more integrated. I believe that what is beautiful about site, or terroir — it is done in the vineyard. Otherwise everyone could make a grand cru wine by manipulation in the cellar.

KJ: You can improve wines in the cellar with some expensive tools.

AMR: Yes, tools can enhance. But they can’t create. Grand cru wines are made in the vineyard and can’t be copied successfully in the lab. I know that we try to be democratic and give every block the chance to grow up and be president, but they are not all created equal. Some are consistently the best, better than their neighboring block that receives the same treatment.

KJ: Yes, but you have also brought the level of farming up on all the blocks and they are all better. Consider the reverse: you can abuse a grand cru site, whether through neglect or greed and over-cropping. All systems must be operating properly, in the vineyard and the winery, to realize the potential of any site, grand cru included.

AMR: That’s true. I know that the grand cru system has been heavily marketed and has some fluff or hype attached to it, but if you strip it all away, there’s still something to it. In general, the model holds true.

So, we know we can intensify tannins, but is some soul missing in the wines?

KJ: Something did seem a little hollow in the middle. But this is only tasting number one of our tannin trials. I was talking to a good friend and fellow winemaker about the necessity of keeping these lots separate through next August. Those higher tannin lots hold onto a lot. They are tight and compacted now, but we need to reserve final judgment until before bottling. In Burgundy, the village barrel samples often taste better and prettier than the grand crus early on.

AMR: You’re correct. It’s one tasting. And once again we refer to the grand cru model.

This rain is warm. My sweatshirt got wet, but I didn’t even notice it because I felt no cold. Even in Mexico, around Guadalajara, over the holidays it was quite warm, in the 70’s during the day. We stay awake almost all night there, and although it was very cold from 3 until 6 am with frost on the grass, as soon as the sun rose, it began to warm up. Temperatures ranged from 30 to almost 80 degrees.

We didn’t have this kind of rain here last year. So far, 2008 reminds me of 2006. As Anne wrote in a previous post, most of us who work in the vineyards take two weeks vacation for the holidays. In 2006, we worked for a day or two after vacation, and then we had to sit for a week while it rained. I wonder if 2008 will be like 2006 in other ways.

We just started pruning last Wednesday, the second day of the new year. If it’s not raining, we go in. Mud is part of our lives.

We prepared well last fall. It was so dry through 2007 that we did do some post-harvest watering for the winter. I often compare vines to the human body. If they dehydrate, they are stressed, and the sap can plug up if it’s too dry.

Despite the dry weather, the mild summer did not stress the vines. It was a long season, but the crop was not heavy, so there was not so much demand on them.

A lot of growers started pruning in December. Pruning earlier will cause the vines to push out earlier, but do they want to push the season ahead? No. I think it’s logistics. They want to use their crews.

We prune later to delay bud break for frost protection. The later the vines push, the better. The time between bud break and flowering can vary widely, and that’s driven by weather. We want the most even conditions we can get. The plant doesn’t like a lack of continuity. Once it flowers, the timetable is more precise.

We marked our vines to indicate virus levels last year before they lost their leaves. Now we can monitor how they do. We will prune the same this year, but we’ll thin more crop to offset possible effects from virus.

We have both cordon-pruned and cane-pruned vines. Cane pruning offers more options and so requires more decision-making. Ironically, our prime block for Donum, 490, is on the cordon, and we don’t want to change anything because the wines are so good. We also have some cordon on 4A07 of the Ferguson Block, but the rest is all cane.

In Carneros, it’s often cold and windy or wet at bud break. On the cordon, you leave the first two buds, but sometimes in cold weather, those buds are not very vigorous. On canes, if the first two buds don’t push, all the rest will.

On the other hand, the cordon arms are like trunks, and they store a lot of nutrients for the beginning of the season so that you can get a nice even push. A cane has a much smaller diameter, so it’s like a little seedling, slower, more fragile and more uneven. We deal with that with techniques - making canes shorter, suckering earlier, forcing energy to buds in the positions we want. Our goal is to make the canes look as even as cordons.

Usually the cordon-pruned vines yield less than cane-pruned vines, but last year in a vintage of low yields (40% lower than 2006, 25% less than normal), the cordon vines in 490 produced a normal-sized crop.

Our clay soils retain water and stay cooler, so the vines are typically behind other areas. Also, because Pinot Noir pushes out later than Chardonnay, we can time the pruning by varietal. One advantage to other growers pruning early is that if we get way behind, there are guys available to help us. For right now, we have no choice but to watch it rain.

As early ripening clones, the Dijons all are particularly suited for questionable cool-climate areas where other selections might not ripen sufficiently – around Freestone in western Sonoma County, for example. Fruit-forward wines are easier to accomplish with the Dijon Pinot Noir clones.

It’s interesting that we often lump them together in casual conversation, because they really seem to need each other. They do not seem to function as successfully as some stand-alone selections like Martini. So we tend to blend them in winemaking.

Talking to growers in Burgundy, Kenneth was told that they often blend them from the start. Growers there will order a mixture of Dijon clones and essentially plant a field blend. It’s also true that our own selections, like Martini and Swan, actually are not really stand-alones, but rather are de facto field blends because genetic sports or mutations continually occur in the vineyard and, thus, in the budwood selection process.

So, while we tend to keep our Dijon clones separate in blocks, harvest bins and even fermentation tanks, in practice they are used to complement one another.

What are some of their characteristics? Kenneth and I agree – in general, and all things being equal – that 777 is up front in fruit, more structured and tannic and it tends toward the black fruits end of the flavor spectrum. While 115 shows perfume, has good length and tends toward red fruits, 667 is in the middle. It has a good mid-palate, but also pretty good entry and length.

Of course, fruit profiles can shift depending on site and vintage.

Our new Donum Russian River Valley Pinot Noir, from the Nugent Vineyard (which we planted and farm), is predominately 667 blended with some 115. I also grow some 115 on the seven-acre Blue Farm Vineyard around my house in northwestern Carneros, near the Sangiacomo family’s home ranch a few miles south of the Sonoma plaza. It’s warmer there and not as windy as at The Donum Estate. My home site produces a bigger, more tannic wine with 115 than does Donum.

I also think that the presence of more fog and less wind at the Russian River site brings out the lushness in 667. In 2007, Kenneth and I agree that at both Nugent and Blue Farm, the 115 clone moved more toward blueberry aromas and flavors.

All three Dijon clones are very good ones. They present no special farming problems. As always, the overriding factor is an understanding of what works in the unique combination of climate and soil on a particular site. And finally, there are those delightful vintage variations.

As I mentioned in a previous posting, our core vineyard people are not seasonal workers. They are full-time, benefited employees. This is the time of year when they use vacation time to take their families back home for the holidays.

These employees are professionals, and the quality of their work depends on proper execution, as with any craft. Most members of our crew are somewhere in their thirties, have been with us since the start of this project, and were experienced when they joined us.

Our crew is well-trained, and they understand the nuances of what we want to accomplish. That’s important, because sometimes as we learn and evolve, those nuances change. Collectively, we touch every one of our 120,000 vines eight times each year. That’s not me out there touching all our vines, so it’s important that every one of our people understands not only the unique characteristics of each site on our property, but also exactly what needs to be done. They are my only connection to the vines.

Our approach to farming is very labor-intensive. In the winery, Kenneth and one or two assistants can do all the work. In the vineyard, many more people are required to deal with the same amount of fruit. From time to time, we expand our base crew by working with a labor contractor who knows our operation. Again, the quality of communication between our crew and those who help us is paramount to proper execution and it’s based on good relationships.

Kenneth, Nabor and I are also getting better, developing a common language of communication. We try to utilize everyone’s expertise, and we have progressed through trial and error. For example, what does it really mean if I say we need a “lightly opened canopy?” Nabor has taken it upon himself to carefully define such concepts all the way down the line. We all want to create the best, but the mission can be somewhat subjective and change subtly.

We have an on-going power-versus-elegance discussion. We want wines that are complex and concentrated, but balanced and not over the top. It’s fun, because we’re small and all connected to the whole project, from vine to marketplace.

Our next major challenge is re-planting some blocks and applying what we have learned in the last seven years. I’m focused on selecting the right clones. We can grow almost anything in California’s climate, so we must use years of experience about how each clone performs on a site, factoring in the variations of vintage.

Fortunately, we don’t have to factor in variations in people. The same people execute and learn together year after year. We also bring in consultants like Dr. Phil Freese and Zelma Long to stimulate us and give us fresh ideas so that we don’t become complacent.

During harvest, everything stacks up. Business and personal bills go unpaid and there are piles of unopened mail. But by Thanksgiving, there is time to re-cap the vintage and evaluate aspects of it while they are still fresh in my mind. I think about changes we can make, equipment we should purchase.

I try not to taste the wine until it completes malolactic. Sometimes I do, but less and less. It’s not good, because the wines are typically in an awkward state with high acids, and they can be awkward now and show beautifully later. So what’s the point?

This is a time to reflect, to catch up and plan. It takes until January to get back in the groove. There are definitely post-harvest blues. You are so pumped up for weeks on end, making all these decisions on the run. Everything is thrown at you and you just deal with it.

Suddenly it all stops cold. You go from what has to be done to what needs to be done. And there’s an emotional and intellectual transition. You’re not used to any free time, so you don’t quite know what to do. You have been so focused that you sort of lose contact with the rest of the world.

Most years, you are in crisis mode. This year was a luxury, not nearly as bad. We had ample time and true fruit maturity. That allowed me to capitalize on available tank space for longer macerations (steeping juice or wine with skins for greater extraction of color, flavors) and more cap (layer of skins that float to the top of the tank) manipulation, perhaps four punchdowns rather than three. We had the time to do it and the fruit called for it.

We put in ten- to 12-hour days, not 14 or 16. We had more time to dot each “i” and cross every “t.” In some vintages, you leave something hanging because you’re just too tired to handle it. This year everything was done every day.

We’re scheduled to bottle the 2006 Donum Pinot in February. It’s sitting topped in barrel now. I need to re-evaluate that wine. If it’s ready to bottle, I need to move it from barrel into tank and hold for bottling. In December, it would be nice to do some comparative tastings before gearing up for next year.

Looking back, 2007 in Carneros and Russian River Valley was pretty ideal. The only bad thing is that there wasn’t more of it. Yields were light, but we had perfect weather and great fruit, and the Pinots are stunning. Everything was aligned to give us tremendous flavors, lower alcohols and great acids.

I make a small amount of wine from Oregon, where 2007 was a nail-biting vintage. It was a bad weather harvest. I brought two lots in early to avoid rain and left one lot out on the vine through three inches of rain. I was skeptical, but they all came out really solid. In 2006, Oregon wines were lush, juicy and really flashy. This year will be a classic from good producers, with good tannins, structure and fruit, wines with depth but not flashy.

In California, the 2007 Russian River Pinots will be very pretty, hedonistic and fruit forward, and Carneros Pinots will be very complex and concentrated.