Harvest 2023

Good News and Bad News

Let’s get the bad news out of the way.  We had weather and irrigation issues with the red vines in 2023.  Several clogged lines and algae blooms prevented us from getting enough water to the red section at the beginning of 2023.  Add in the 100+ temperatures in June and July that shut down the vines’ metabolisms and the end result was small clusters with poor fruit.  In the end, just let the birds have what little yield there was.

Good News

Now for some good news.  The Riesling section had a bumper crop.  We got a little over a ton of fruit from just 300 vines.  We harvested in mid-October with a Brix of 22 and an acid value of .55 mg/L.  With the acid being so low, we decided to ferment on the Riesling on their skins for a couple of days before we pressed the grapes.  We wanted to get the acid levels up (for palate cleansing) and some body to the wine.  We’ll see how that turns out.  Fingers crossed!!