oregondabbler
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- Jun 26, 2014
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I have about a half-acre vineyard in Lower Willamette, planted with Pinot Noir, Pinot Gris, Chardonnay and Marchal Foch. I've been hobby farmiing the vineyard for about 20 years but stopped trying to make wine from it about ten years ago. Work and other interests ... you know.
A couple of years ago, I started pruning and cleaning up the vineyard to get it back into production and this year went all-in. Went to war on the blackberries that infested much of the vineyard, pruned, sprayed for PM, and repeated all tasks again and again.
The vineyard looks good and is full of grapes. I have a lot to learn about pruning and almost certainly overcropped. The "noble wine grapes" are behind what I'm hearing from the commercial growers in my area. When I surveyed the grapes last week, they average about 19-20 degrees brix.
So, I decided to hold off harvesting the European grapes until October. In the past, I've harvested as late at October 20 with good results. This is not something that I want to do but I'd rather chance losing the crop than pick unripe fruit and taste my regret for years to come.
The Foch came in at 23 degrees brix and .7% acidity -- ready to pick! I have 49 MF vines and we got a pretty heavy yield yesterday. At this time, there is about 60 gallons of must in barrels in my garage and I pressed about 10 gallons of juice. The juice was given to the people that helped harvest the grapes and to my kind neighbors that have put up with the sound of my spraying the grapes at 5AM every seven to ten days.
I'll get some pictures up if people are interested.
We have some storms about to move through -- it started raining as I am writing this. I don't know what will happen to the grapes that are still on the vines. Maybe they'll be alright or maybe not. We'll see.
Questions, comments and especially advice are sought.
A couple of years ago, I started pruning and cleaning up the vineyard to get it back into production and this year went all-in. Went to war on the blackberries that infested much of the vineyard, pruned, sprayed for PM, and repeated all tasks again and again.
The vineyard looks good and is full of grapes. I have a lot to learn about pruning and almost certainly overcropped. The "noble wine grapes" are behind what I'm hearing from the commercial growers in my area. When I surveyed the grapes last week, they average about 19-20 degrees brix.
So, I decided to hold off harvesting the European grapes until October. In the past, I've harvested as late at October 20 with good results. This is not something that I want to do but I'd rather chance losing the crop than pick unripe fruit and taste my regret for years to come.
The Foch came in at 23 degrees brix and .7% acidity -- ready to pick! I have 49 MF vines and we got a pretty heavy yield yesterday. At this time, there is about 60 gallons of must in barrels in my garage and I pressed about 10 gallons of juice. The juice was given to the people that helped harvest the grapes and to my kind neighbors that have put up with the sound of my spraying the grapes at 5AM every seven to ten days.
I'll get some pictures up if people are interested.
We have some storms about to move through -- it started raining as I am writing this. I don't know what will happen to the grapes that are still on the vines. Maybe they'll be alright or maybe not. We'll see.
Questions, comments and especially advice are sought.