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Vineyard Wind Machines
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Fun Fact by Nancy Hawks Miller, Goosecross: Vineyard Wind Machines
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Bud break in Napa Valley
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Fun Fact by Nancy Hawks Miller, Goosecross.
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Goosecross: Pruning Time in the Vineyard
In this 2-minute video our Winemaker, Geoff Gorsuch, does a show and tells of when and how he prunes the vines. He references the term “buds” several times. For each bud left after he prunes, a shoot will emerge in the spring. He can expect that each shoot will produce one to three clusters of grapes. Enjoy!
It’s Pruning Time in the Vineyard
A vineyard update from Goosecross, Napa Valley, Winemaker Geoff Gorsuch:
I always look forward to pruning season every year because it’s great quiet time out there, just me and the vines. We get a lot of questions this time of year because some vineyards in the valley are already completely pruned, others look quite wild and untamed and still others, like ours, are sort of half pruned. So, let’s talk about timing.
When: The big picture answer is any time from December through February – maybe even into early March. Once we’re sure the vines are dormant, we can start and it’s important to finish before the growing season begins again (bud-break), usually mid-March. Growers and wineries with lots of acreage will start as early as possible in order to get done on time. For the small grower, like Goosecross, there are a couple of reasons we like to prune at the last minute when we can.
One is to protect the vines from a fungus called eutypa die back (common name: “dead-arm disease”). During the rainy season, the spores are everywhere and will infect fresh pruning wounds. If we prune late, often the worst of the rain is behind us, plus the wounds develop resistance faster. But now, in the height of the rainy season our partially-pruned vines are still OK because eutypa moves so slowly. There’s no way it can travel all the way down these foot-long shoots to the cordon before March so the damaged plant material, if any, will be pruned off later.
The other reason to prune late is that it may delay the onset of bud-break, slightly, and spare us some of the lost sleep and expense of protecting the new growth from frost.
So, what about these half-pruned vines? In order to make quick work of our last-minute pruning, we get the worst of it done in advance. Last year’s shoots were a tangled mess, clinging to the trellis wires, so we got that cleaned up so we can finish the job quickly and easily later.
How: The vines need to be severely pruned, kind of like roses. From a wild tangle of shoots that are 3-5 feet long, I bring it down to what looks like almost nothing — just the vine skeleton.
Our vines are trained into what is called a bi-lateral cordon (two permanent arms) and we use what is called vertical shoot positioning (VSP), which means the shoots are trained up vertically, through the trellis wires. VSP maximizes light exposure to the leaves, which helps heighten fruitiness, and provides filtered light to the clusters.
I leave several small protrusions on the cordons, called spurs. The spurs contain the buds (growing points) for the next season’s shoots. The theory is that for each bud, I’ll get a new shoot in the spring. From each new shoot, I can expect about two clusters.
The problem is that the vines don’t read the textbook, and I’m bound to have some surprises. So, I’ll go through in April, to see what actually happened, and inevitably do some shoot thinning. If there are too many shoots and the canopy is dense, it blocks the light and increases mildew and mold problems. Plus the extra shoots produce excess clusters, which can compromise quality.
In late May, after flowering, I’ll make cluster counts to see if I need to do any thinning. There’s nothing I can do about too few, but if there are more clusters than I anticipated, the grapes may not ripen properly and could lack flavor intensity.
Every year is a new ballgame, but one thing we know for sure: Quantity and quality hardly ever go together, when it comes to wine, so careful winter pruning and thinning, later, during the growing season is critical to the quality of the vintage.
So, we’ve already done our “pre-pruning” and we’ll finish up in late February. Happy New Year!
Harvest Update from Goosecross
Our Harvest Calendar tells the story. September brought us a few blasts of heat and the grapes came rolling in at a fairly rapid fire. The bad news: It’s exhausting to have so many burners going at once. The good news: A lot of the really hard work is behind us, now, so we begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel. 
So, how’s it going? Of course, you expect me to say it’s going great, so I’ll be pleased to oblige! After the roller coaster that was 2008, this has been a beautiful growing season.
Number one, flavors are right where I want them. Beautiful balance, great flavor intensity.
Number two, yields are nice and normal. In some cases, like our Cabernet Franc, even generous! That’s a relief, although not surprising. When the vines pull back one year they often pour it on in the next.
As we reported, at the end of August, we started our harvest significantly later than we did in 2008. Aside from a few heat blasts along the way, this has been a decidedly cool growing season. Some wineries are still quite a bit behind schedule, but we’ve caught up nicely, thanks to that warm September. Early isn’t the best, in most cases, because it may mean inadequate “hang time” in terms of flavor maturity, unless the whole season was early. Late is a little scary because we can run into rain. A little rain doesn’t much matter, but heavy rainfall can cause rot, mildew, dilution… Some varieties are more susceptible than others.
So, we’ve got Petit Verdot – all three rows of it 
coming in Sunday and Syrah, probably, next week and we’re home free! Let’s hope Mother Nature continues to smile on us! Cheers!
Goosecross: The “Green Harvest”
Geoff does a show and tell on how and why clusters are often thinned as harvest approaches. Enjoy!
The grapes are changing color!
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Fun fact by Nancy Hawks Miller: The grapes are changing color!
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Goosecross: Springtime Shoot Thinning
Geoff Gorsuch shows how and why shoots are thinned in the vineyard.
Cluster Thinning
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Fun fact by Nancy Hawks Miller: Cluster Thinning
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Pinot Noir
Common synonyms: Pineau de Bourgoyne, Franc Pineau, Noirien, Salvagnnin, Morillon, Auvernat, Auvernaut noir, Plant Dore, Vert dore, Burgunder blauer, Blauer Spatburgunder, Clavner, Blauer-Klavner, Schwarzer Riesling, Mohrchen, Schwarzer Burgunder, Pinot nera, Blauer Nurnberger, Nagyburgundi
They say that if Cabernet Sauvignon is the thinking man’s wine, Pinot Noir is pure pleasure. But, it’s viewed as a problem child in both the vineyard and the winery, and perhaps the only reason it’s survived over the centuries is that when it comes together just right, it makes some of the silkiest, most sensual of wines.
This is perhaps the oldest variety we know and researchers believe it’s probably a selection from wild vines made by the Romans perhaps as long as 2000 years ago. It appears that Pinot Noir was called Morillon Noir in the Burgundy region of France in the 4th century AD, and by the 14th century it was still known by several names, including Pinot Noir. It was grown in different parts of France, but the Burgundy region made it famous and it was and is a key player in the Champagne region.
If you’ve noticed some variability among the Pinot Noirs you’ve tried, one likely explanation is the difficulty of cultivation. It buds early in the spring, exposing it to frost damage and flowers early, too, increasing the risk of poor pollination. It’s best confined to the coolest wine-growing regions or it loses aromatics and acidity. The yields must be kept low and it has to be handled with kid gloves in the winery, too, or the results don’t justify the effort.
Another reason for variability is that it’s an unstable variety, and tends to mutate more readily than other varieties. It’s not uncommon to find one or more vines in a section with a single shoot that has characteristics that differ from the others on the same plant. If you took cuttings from several different vines from and old Pinot vineyard to start another, you’d probably end up with a number of slightly different representations of Pinot Noir, and some of them better than others. It’s only been relatively recently that we’ve realized that we need to make careful and controlled clonal selections if we want to grow top notch fruit.
This is an early-maturing variety that needs to ripen slowly, which explains why it found a happy home in Burgundy and Champagne. It grows all over eastern France and you can also find it in Germany, Switzerland and parts of northern Italy. Pinot Noir from the new world didn’t make much of an impression until relatively recently. Here in California, for the most part, it made dull, light-bodied red wine until about the 1980s when we began to get smart about clones and where to plant it. The breezy marine influence of the Carneros region is our home for Pinot in the Napa Valley and it does very well in other cool spots in California, notably the Russian River Valley, Sonoma Coast, Santa Maria and Santa Rita Hills AVA. Oregon came on strong about the same time we geared up here in California and there’s a lot of excitement about the Pinot coming out of New Zealand.
Pinot Noir prefers to fly solo, in most cases, rather than being blended and tends to reflect its environment more than having a dominant, unmistakable flavor profile. In fact it’s been said that the Burgundians view Pinot Noir as a vehicle for expressing the local terroir more than a showcase for their efforts. The most common descriptors are those of red fruit, like strawberries and raspberries and often a sense of gaminess or earthiness. It’s a thin-skinned grape so the wine is usually very soft on the palate. You can find ones with tremendous color concentration and big tannins but Pinot Noir is more often a subtle, graceful red.
The silky texture makes Pinot Noir easy to enjoy when it’s young and very versatile at the table. It’s a favorite with salmon, but it can run the gamut from grilled Ahi, to the Thanksgiving turkey to roast lamb or a good steak. The soft tannins also make Pinot Noir an easier match with cheese than other reds so it’s a great one to include in your wine and cheese party with cheeses that range from semi-soft to quite firm. You can find delicious recipes to pair with Pinot Noir or any other variety if you go to Colleen’s Kitchen.
Flavor profile: Sweet, red fruit, cherry, strawberry, raspberry, rose petal, earthy, mushroom, forest floor, violet, green tea
Weight: Light to medium bodied, silky texture
