Onwards.
The impacts of the April 21st frost will be felt for the remainder of the growing season. Mostly in the form of extra work for less fruit. That’s generally the game mother nature likes to play. When she gives you perfect growing conditions, the vineyard requires less labor, and the quality of fruit is inherently better. In a difficult year, you must work twice as hard to obtain the same quality, if you’re lucky.
I’m still optimistic about producing a Concerto in 2026. Mainly because our Cabernet Sauvignon was not impacted by the frost (pictured is 4 year old CS vines). The hill protected most of it from the cold air, and late pruning also helped delay bud break just enough for it to hold back until it was safe to emerge. I only wish we had more of it.
I am a bit concerned with Cabernet Franc, as we did see some frost damage there. We lost on average 2 out of 8 fruitful “primary” shoots per vine. Not as much as I previously thought. If all 8 shoots survived the frost, we would remove (shoot thin) all other green growth to keep the vine balanced and aerated. But, they didn’t all survive, we lost 2 of 8, and they must be replaced somehow.
The location from where these “replacement” shoots bud out from is not good, as it leads to over crowing. Overcrowding leads to other issues. The only purpose of these replacement shoots is to displace excess energy from the vine, promoting balanced growth. To add insult to injury, these shoots rarely produce any fruit.
We’re essentially crowding up our trellis with unproductive growth that takes up space we don’t have. I’ll spare you the fine details, but it’s a headache of a process, and makes shoot thinning take twice as long.
On some vines we’re seeing secondary shoots emerge from beneath the dead primary shoots. Some of these secondary shoots may even bear fruit. The problem is, we don’t want fruit from these shoots. Fruit from secondary shoots will be significantly less ripe than fruit from primary shoots.
How do we identify fruit clusters from primary vs. secondary shoots? It’s difficult, but in a perfect world, we’ll see them lagging behind in color development (during veraison in August). From there, we drop those secondary clusters to the ground. While they will increase much needed quantity, they are underripe and will decrease quality. I’d rather make a little bit of good wine, than a lot of bad wine. Lots of extra work overall, but it can be done.
Anyhow, thank you to all who have expressed concern for all of the farmers in our region. Our team is overwhelmed by the outpouring of love and support, and happy to see so much appreciation for our work, and the resulting wines. I hope to see you all soon!
-Adam
