7 January 2007

The cold North winds of January are blowing through the vineyards, leaving nary a leaf. The season of Autumn color has long passed. In the bare vineyards the vine architecture is now easy to recognize. As I drive from my home on Rockpile Road, down to the Dry Creek Valley, I pass vines trained in many different ways. There are many old Zinfandel vineyards, such as the one at the Passalacqua Winery, in which vines are still head trained (no permanent arms) and spur pruned (a certain number of strong canes are selected and cut back or pruned to usually one or two buds). Up on Rockpile, the Zin is trained to bilateral cordons (two permanent arms make the vine look like a “T”) with vertical shoot positioning (the wire trellis system consists of several wires that securely hold each year’s growth canes straight up). The Florences, who grow for Rosenblum and Carol Shelton, found that head trained vines suffered in the high winds that we have up along the ridge line: young canes broke and leaves tattered. Also, with our poor rocky soils on Rockpile, overbearing on cordons is not a worry.

This particular training system gained favor as vineyards were replanted due to the recent Phyloxera epidemic of the 1990’s. It makes many vineyard operations easier and more effective because the fruit ends up in a linear zone, just above the cordon arms. Sulfur spraying is more on target, hitting the fruit instead of the leafy canopy. Vines can be machine harvested but hand picking is much faster, too, with this training method. However, growers must guard against over exposure of fruit to sun. If too many leaves are pulled off around the clusters, grape skins will actually become sunburned! The skins develop hard, brown scabs that are concentrated areas of bitter tannins and brown color, particularly noticeable in Chardonnay juice. Most new vineyards are now planted with rows oriented North-South. When leaves are pulled to increase sun exposure, spray exposure, air circulation, etc., they are only pulled off on the East side of the vines, facing the morning sun at the coolest time of day.

Meanwhile in the cellar the young wines of 2006 are slowly growing out of infancy and showing more personality. Most of them are out of their malolactic funks and speaking again in tones of fruit and oak. There has been time for oak extraction, particularly in the new barrels. I’m excited about the new Sirugue barrels in the Pinot Noir. Their bacony-sausage smokiness marries well with the leather-cherry of the Preston Ranch clone 777 which I harvested last Fall. I think the Pinot is going to be a lighter, more elegant wine than the previous three vintages but should have enhanced complexity and color because of the cooler weather and longer hang time.

Come and taste the wine with me as it develops in barrel. Write to me at Contacts@davenportwines.com to schedule an appointment with me at the Passalacqua Winery in Dry Creek Valley, Healdsburg.