Winemaker’s Musings June 2016

Winemaker’s Musings What a spring! The vines are looking great. We are seeing the largest and best growing crop in several years. As most of you know the last couple years have been a bit lean. We began a new foliar fertilization program that targets essential micronutrients the vines need at different parts of it growth cycle. This combines with good rain and soil conditions has led to a very promising crop. Now if the summer holds up we will have a great harvest. I will just need everybody to start drinking more though! It will still be some time before we know the quality of this year’s harvest. I will have a pretty good idea in August. As for last year’s wines, Wow, there is some really good stuff. We have won a dozen or so medals with three of those being Gold and several Silver amongst them. One to highlight is our 2014 Chambourcin. It won a Gold Medal at the Jerry Mead International Wine competition in California with a 94 POINT RATING. It is going fast, but I think the 2015 vintage is just as good. One wine to note of the 2015 barrel aged wines is our Norton. It is grown by a vineyard that believes in organic farming. So his harvests have been spotty at times as it is a tough way to do it. But this year the wine is really nice. Expect it to be available this summer sometime. Since this is a rare treat the price point will be up a bit over our normal pricing.