Author Archives: Gus

Flowering and Fruit Set

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Posted by Gus on July 26, 2010 – 2:02 pm
Filed under In The Vineyard

Despite the cold, wet spring the vines have valiantly produced flowers, and have optimistically set a plentiful-looking crop. This is certainly a relief to growers and winemakers alike, who have been concerned about the difficult spring weather and the effect it may have on the 2010 vintage.

The only lasting impact from the wet spring has been to delay fruit development by about two weeks, which has most of us hoping for a warm, dry September and October.

That other pesky weather event of 2010, the May frost, has had the unfortunate, albeit not unexpected, effect of peppering certain areas of the vineyard with secondary shoots, whose clusters are forming yet another two weeks behind the already-delayed primary clusters.

The photo above (from July 7th) shows a still unopened, recently formed flower-cluster, from a secondary shoot, while the cluster on the lower right has already finished flowering and has set fruit – yes, those little green balls will become ripe, golden berries on this Viognier vine (or so we hope).

Few people want to harvest a vineyard block twice, picking the primary clusters on the first pass and the secondaries on the next (not to be confused with the small secondary clusters that emerge later in the season from lateral growth up higher in the vine’s canopy). For that reason, and to avoid the possibility this fall of mistakenly picking undeveloped clusters into a bin of otherwise ripe fruit, these secondary clusters will be removed at the time of leaf thinning, within the next week or two.

And quality? Of course we all want to be able to predict what sort of promise the vintage holds, but the truth is that at this point there are far too many variables at play. So far the summer is dealing us a very good hand, providing plenty of sunshine without excess heat, so the vines are able to photosynthesize as much as they’d like. The next point of reckoning will be at seed-hardening, when we’ll glance at the calendar again and see whether we’ve made up any of the lost time.

Bottling the 2009 Velo Malbec Rosé

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Posted by Gus on June 16, 2010 – 8:46 am
Filed under In The Cellar

The 2009 Velo Malbec Rosé was bottled on May 4th with a mobile bottling truck at RoxyAnn Winery in Medford. Working at better than a bottle per second, the line and crew made short work of my tiny (156 case) production.

Two days later Vernon Rollins at New Sammy’s Cowboy Bistro in Talent, a few stones’ throws from where the grapes are grown, paid me a high compliment by taking a case of the new wine as his house rosé pour.

Now, more than a month after bottling, the wine is really showing its stuff, with fabulous aromas of grapefruit and strawberry-rhubarb, and a now signature racy acidity against a bone-dry finish with vibrant flavors of wild strawberries and cream.

Velocity Moves to Pallet Wine Company

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Posted by Gus on June 14, 2010 – 2:09 pm
Filed under In The Cellar

May 27th, 2010 was moving day for Velocity Cellars. After eight fine vintages under the roof of RoxyAnn Winery in Medford, including six for which I worked as RoxyAnn’s winemaker, the day finally came for me to move on.

How does a winery just pick up and move? In my case, the advantage of being a winemaker with neither buildings nor equipment comes through in just this sort of situation. I hired a big truck and we moved eighty barrels across town in one morning with the help of Les (the driver), Peter (loading at Roxyann) and Linda and Josh (unloading at the other end).

Pallet Wine Company, my new home, is located just across town from my old digs at Roxyann, in an historic industrial building which has found a new life as a winery under the direction of Dan and Olivia Sullivan and their talented winemaker/partner Linda Donovan. Besides the lovely new paint job, they have transformed the interior into a full-scale production facility, complete with underground barrel storage, state-of-the-art crush equipment, and even a ROPP head on their bottling line (that’s industry-talk for a screwcap applicator, of which I am a big fan).

Why move? It is never an easy decision to make a big change, and in this case I was certainly in the enviable position of having a choice between two excellent facilities. In the end, the driving force had to be wine style. Pallet will permit me to undertake three significant shifts in my production: native yeast fermentation, micro-lot fermentation, and on-demand bottling under a screwcap, all of which will, I hope, allow me to better pursue my goal of truly regionally distinctive wines.

Thanks, Roxyann, for eight great years. Thanks, Pallet, for the opportunity to share your great facility in the coming years. And thanks, Linda, for a flawless job unloading barrels!

The Glamorous Art of Pruning, Part 2

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Posted by Gus on May 24, 2010 – 3:07 pm
Filed under In The Vineyard

Nearly two months have passed since I wrote about pruning. Here in the Rogue Valley we’ve spent much of that time waiting and worrying. It has been cold, and very wet, and our vines are off to a slow start. On May 6th we had a frosty night, with temperatures dipping several degrees below freezing and causing some damage to the tender, young shoots.

From an academic perspective, these are interesting times to evaluate the pros and cons of the two main pruning techniques, spur and cane. From a vineyard management perspective, however, it is downright annoying. The results of the frost will be felt throughout the growing season, requiring additional hand-work and a sharp eye to spot the shoots and clusters which, having formed from secondary buds when the primary one got frozen, will be ripening fruit (if at all) at a pace behind that of the majority of the vineyard. We will have to be vigilant early on about removing any fruit which threatens to be unripe at harvest time.

Upon inspection at Gold vineyard, the spur-pruned plants appeared to have done a little better in the cold, if only because at each spur position there were five or six green shoots, so there was some insurance against loss of the uppermost (albeit the most fruitful) ones. The vines with canes that were frosted, however, will likely have areas devoid of healthy shoots and will yield a reduced crop as a result.

Still, there are plenty of very healthy-looking shoots out there. These are Viognier from Gold vineyard:

This cane-pruned example shows how nicely this pruning method provides a well-spaced, uncluttered line of shoots, making the process of shoot thinning (removing excess shoots to prevent crowding) relatively fast and easy. This is, in my mind, one of the big advantages of cane pruning, compared to the relative clutter of growth at each spur.

Which would I rather shoot-thin? One can see that there is fairly little to do to the cane, while the thinning of just two spurs on a cordon required some careful work on this Sauvignon Blanc at Upper Five Vineyard.

Before shoot thinning:

…and after:

Terry Sullivan has chosen cordon pruning, with its orderly rows of short spurs, for his vineyard for the simple reason that he doesn’t like to cane prune. Regardless of his motivations, it seems a wise choice considering the vigor of his Sauvignon Blanc, and the wider spaces between vines to accommodate its growth habit. Cane pruning can be troublesome at spacing greater than six feet between vines, so the permanent cordon makes sense here.

Still, just like the pruning process itself, the resulting shoot-thinning process is more repetitive and simple with the spur, and more nuanced and subjective with the cane. When evenness and consistency are the goal, the spur is difficult to get wrong, and so is currently the preferred choice of most winegrowers in this region.

We would be wise to remember, however, that the first buds on every new shoot in 2010, whether it grows from a cane or a spur, are forming in unfavorably cool conditions, which will tend to restrict their fruitfulness in the following year. Spur-pruned vines in particular may shower fewer, smaller clusters in 2011 because of this cold spring. The good news is that this can sometimes mean less work thinning the crop down, and may even bode well for a low-yielding, high-quality vintage.

But first we’ll get through this one.

The Glamorous Art of Pruning, Part 1

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Posted by Gus on March 29, 2010 – 1:59 pm
Filed under In The Vineyard

So much goes into making a good bottle of wine. Besides the requisite rows of polished stainless tanks and candle-lit chestnut-hooped barrels, there is the furrowed brow of the philosophical winemaker and the vast, imposing backdrop of the arched and pillared winery itself. Surely there is little significance, and certainly less glamor, out in the muddy, dormant vineyard in winter?

Winemakers joke about the most important tool of their trade. For some it is their nose, for some a mop, and now, perhaps, it is even the ubiquitous Blackberry, iPhone, or the like. For me, just ahead of my bicycle, it is a pair of pruning shears. Mine are standard-issue Felco no. 2. I don’t use them as frequently or as vigorously as I used to, but they accompany me on critical trips to the vineyard.

Pruning is not glamorous. It is done in unpleasant weather, all day long, quite monotonously. It is not highly-paid work, and rarely garners public attention like a pressing or a bottling might. Yet the well-executed art of the pruner lays the foundation for the production of all high-quality wines.

Left to its own devices, a grapevine will produce a tangle of shoots, in the hope that one or two will find their way to the top of a tree and produce some fruit there which may prove attractive to a passing bird, thereby assuring the continuity of the species. In brief, the goal of pruning (and subsequent vine management) is to fool the vine into thinking that every one of its grape clusters is so ideally positioned, and therefore to pack every berry with maximum flavor for the fortunate bird. Pruning is also the first, and most important, step in controlling yield, helping assure that the vine’s limited resources are allocated to only as much fruit as can confidently achieve ripeness.

All pruning methods are some adaptation of either cane or spur pruning – two words which capture the somewhat punitive nature of the task. Whether one is employing one of the many common variations on the theme, including guyot, bi-lateral cordon, lyre, Scott Henry, or simple head-pruning, one is still making use of either a cane, shown here,

or a spur, shown here,

to achieve the above goals of fruit-positioning and crop limitation. The obvious difference is that the spur pruning method makes use of several short sections of last-year’s growth to provide this year’s fruiting wood, while the cane pruning method employs one or two longer canes per vine. Thus, while both vines may have been pruned to, say, twenty buds per vine, the cane-pruned vine achieves this with two ten-bud canes, while the spur pruned vine achieves it with ten two-bud spurs. Sharp eyes will notice that the above cane-pruned vine also has one spur on each side, to provide next year’s cane and  spur.

Why should this matter? Pruning style is usually determined by varietal, region, and the preferences of the vineyard manager. Certain varietals may bear fruit more consistently when cane pruned, especially those varietals which do not have very fruitful basal buds – the first bud on the shoot, which is always one of the two or three buds left on a spur. Other varietals perform better when spur pruned, and would yield inconsistently on a cane. Vineyards in cooler regions tend to lean more towards cane pruning, since it is a type of pruning that provides a degree of insurance against wild swings in crop load by not relying solely on the fruitfulness of the first two or three buds on a shoot. Those first few buds are the first to form, and therefore are the most likely to have developed during cold weather, a challenge which can restrict their tendency to bear fruit.

The cane vs. spur decision is also frequently a matter of logistics. Spur pruning of any sort is generally easier to teach and practice, and requires less subjective decision-making on the part of the person wielding the shears. This can be a relief to the vineyard manager looking for absolute consistency in the vineyard, where the varying pruning styles of individual workers does not have any real impact on the shape of the vines from row to row.

Cane pruning is often considered more of an art. The pruner must look at the vine as a whole, select a new fruiting cane of adequate girth, length, and position, make a cut to improve or maintain the desired shape of the vine, then take the added step of planning for the following year by leaving a renewal spur in a location that won’t interfere with the shoots growing from the fruiting cane, and that will maintain a low vine head. A skilled pruner enjoys the challenges of cane pruning, but when it is done badly it can create a lot of extra work in the vineyard.

The look of a cane pruned vineyard in early spring is unmistakable: light, airy, orderly and elegant.

In part two I will explore how two neighboring vineyards employ different pruning tactics, and why.

The New World Winery Continuum

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Posted by Gus on March 2, 2010 – 12:08 pm
Filed under A Matter Of Style

The act of drinking a glass of wine is nearly always, in some small way, coupled with the act of envisioning the source of that wine, which is usually some variation on the theme of rolling vineyards adjacent to an historic stone (old world) or wooden (new world) winery. This image exists in part because it can actually be true, and partly because the hard-working souls who put the wine in the bottle want you to believe it is true, but it is very often pure illusion.

This is in no way a bad thing. The fact is that the very definition of a winery falls on a rather broad continuum, from ancient bricks and mortar to the genuinely virtual. What really matters is what is in the glass.

In the old world, or Europe for simplicity, if the wine is even moderately expensive one can rest fairly comfortably on the notion that, indeed, hand-tended vineyards adjoin the vine-covered cellars. Complexity sets in, however, when a château releases a second label, or produces a domaine-appellation wine alongside its estate product. Throw in the grower cooperatives and, of course, the négociants, and it becomes considerably more difficult to answer the question, “which winery made this wine?” The savvy consumer of old world wine, therefore, is guided more by name, reputation, and appellation of origin than by an image of a grand château.

The new world has managed to re-imagine the winery even more thoroughly. By casting out the vision of bricks, mortar and estate vineyards as essential, the new world wine industry has re-defined a winery to be, quite simply, a vision.

Examples of this wine vision fall at many points along the new world winery continuum. One of the most commonly understood is the winery which does its own winemaking but purchases all of its grapes. Or, a winery may be simply a vineyard, growing and harvesting grapes which are then brought to a contracted wine production facility, where the wine is “custom crushed” and eventually bottled under the vineyard’s own label. Custom crush can also be a way for a winemaker to fulfill a vision, by overseeing his own production at a facility hosting more than one, and often several, wine “visionaries”. In some cases the visionary may be neither winemaker nor grape grower, but someone passionate enough to make an investment in wine production and willing to both purchase grapes and contract the winemaking for the project.

Of course, vision aside, every wine must have begun in a vineyard and finished up in a wine cellar. Yet the multitude of means to the end creates a range of opportunities for the would-be wine producer, and consequently allows for the availability of a broad range of wine styles to the consumer. When a winery no longer has to overcome the significant economic barriers to establishing the traditional vineyard and production facility, the industry is no longer the exclusive domain of wealthy individuals or large corporations. The resulting infusion of small to medium scale wineries, some entirely working with purchased grapes and shared facilities, results in many wines which share the same essential attributes of their more traditionally-produced brethren: a distinctly regional stamp of style and an individual stamp of character.

Consumers and wineries alike should absolutely embrace this continuum, as much as it may undermine the romantic definition of a winery, as a natural adaptation of the wine industry to the challenge of bringing interesting, enjoyable wines spanning a broad range of styles to the public. A winery, defined, is really no more than a way to bring an experience to one’s glass. The business model it applies to reach that goal is of little consequence to the wine itself.

Organic Viticulture in the Rogue Valley

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Posted by Gus on February 26, 2010 – 10:03 pm
Filed under From The Bike, In The Vineyard

I just got back from my first visit in several years to Upper Five Vineyard in Talent. Terry and Molly Sullivan have been farming this five-acre parcel of vines since 2003, and they’ve been doing it organically from day one. I’ve always thought the site showed promise, but when you combine a great site with the kind of attentive care these two bestow on their vineyard great things can result.

They have planted Tempranillo, Syrah, Viognier, Grenache and Sauvignon blanc in classic Rogue Valley fashion, spanning the globe and a taster’s palate with their varietal choices. To round things out they have embarked on small scale organic pear production, as well as raising organic melons for the local market.

The ground springs underfoot as you step down a vineyard row, indicating healthy, un-compacted soil. Our conversation drifted back and forth from the technical (clones, rootstocks, mechanical weed cultivation, compost, pruning) to the philosophical. Terry likes to say that his strongest argument for farming organically is “because people live here.”

Of course I had to ride my bike out for the visit, to challenge my “intimate knowledge of the land” hypothesis. Unfortunately, this meant riding through a thick cloud of putrid lime-sulfur spray as I passed one of the orchards about a half-mile down the road, so it was a relief to breathe the clean higher-elevation air at Upper Five. My conveyance also created an unexpected limitation when Terry gave me a bottle of Grochau Cellars 2008 Sauvignon blanc, made from Upper Five grapes.

Anyone who has bike toured in wine country knows that a tall, narrow claret-style bottle slips easily into one’s water bottle cage with little more than a mild rattle as one rolls along, yet this bottle resisted the standard approach. My first attempt at securing my gift proved ineffective, as I was only just out of the dirt driveway when the bottle leapt out and clattered down the road. The results were nearly disastrous:

I figured out a better, albeit precarious, way to hold the damaged bottle, and made my way home against a headwind. It has always been my contention that wine tastes better when enjoyed close to its source, and this particular bottle enjoys the distinction of literally touching the ground from which it came. I will give it a week to recover from its rough treatment before sampling, and will report back on how the wine fared.

2009 Vintage Honest Appraisal

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Posted by Gus on February 24, 2010 – 3:15 pm
Filed under Uncategorized

I’m back from the cellar and can honestly say I’m a bit confused and disappointed. The 2009 reds were simply not tasting all that exciting today. Still, wines do go through these dull periods, especially post SO2 addition (check) and when eager for a racking (check). After agonizing for a bit I simply decided not to decide.

I’ll go back in a week or two and we’ll see if they are friendlier. I may also draw off some samples and let them rest/breathe for a day before subjecting them to more critical evaluation.

Or maybe it’s just me. Or the weather.

On a positive note, the Viognier/Marsanne is tasting fabulously of peaches and cream, and the 2008 Velocity is a joy.

Blending 2009 Velocity and Velo

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Posted by Gus on February 24, 2010 – 9:39 am
Filed under In The Cellar

It’s time to head back into the cellar. In these winter months it is easy to be distracted by the unfortunate necessities of business planning, marketing, and other dreary desk-work, but the wines are calling.
Barrel tasting at this stage actually becomes (yes, it’s true) hard work. Over the next few days I’ll be individually sampling each barrel from the 2009 vintage in preparation for one of the most crucial steps in the élevage (upbringing, or raising, of wines, as children more or less) of the new wines: blending.
I like to blend early, to encourage integrated flavors and stable wine, so the blending decision is a bit like deciding what you’re going to be when you grow up, except that you don’t get to change your mind later. So, I go through the barrel stacks and look for wines that show structure, intensity, purity of fruit and age-worthiness; those barrels are put into consideration for the Velocity bottling.
If the wine tastes friendlier, yummier, perhaps a bit softer and more vigorously youthful, it is a clear candidate for bottling under the Velo label. Then comes the fun part – assembling the components. Just because, say, seventeen barrels show Velocity-level promise, that doesn’t mean that those should simply be tossed together and called a wine. Now I get to play with the proportions in an attempt to blend a wine which will display the kind of balance, elegance, and focus I strive for. Perhaps a bit more block B, or less block A; maybe a dash of Cabernet franc will spice up the Malbec, but which barrel is best suited for the job?
So, off I go armed with my palate, my instincts and a sturdy glass, to start clambering around the barrel stacks.

Velocity Cellars Supports Rogue Valley Farm To School Fundraising Dinner

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Posted by Gus on February 5, 2010 – 2:03 pm
Filed under Open Bottle

Julia and I were fortunate enough to find ourselves invited last Sunday night to the second annual Rogue Valley Farm To School fundraising dinner at New Sammy’s Cowboy Bistro in Talent. It may have helped that I donated one of the wines for the dinner, but it seemed like we got the best end of the bargain by being seated at the bar and getting to enjoy an astounding meal. The food alone would require pages to describe, starting with an extraordinary array of tapas, moving to an elaborate paella, a cheese course and chocolate-cinnamon olive-oil cake with homemade almond ice cream for dessert. Perhaps best of all was the fact that every dime of the proceeds went to an extremely worthy cause, the above mentioned RVFarm2School, which provides locally-grown food to school cafeterias. Even the very gracious servers donated their tips.
Thank you, Tracy Harding, for including my wine, and thanks to all the staff and volunteers at New Sammy’s that night for your hard work. We had a ball!