Pinot grigio peekaboo.

The other day, during a friendly chat, the vineyard manager at TWWIAGE asked me if I had had any problems with fruit set this year. He mentioned to me that he'd noticed that there were a lot of "singles" in the Cabernet sauvignon vines, i.e., one cluster per shoot when there normally would be two. Nope, I hadn't noticed this particular phenomenon in Vinoland.  But then I have mostly been concentrating my suckering/shoot thinning and stuffing efforts in the Pinot grigio and the Syrah blocks.  I will be working in the Cabernet sauvignon tomorrow, so I will have a closer look.
This partial Pinot grigio cluster, caught up in the sinus of a leaf (a mini viticultural-hammock), seems to be following normal morphological progress, as does the entire vine.  There wouldn't be such a thing as a vintage if every growing season was the same.

Still, yet another week later.

With 3.5 inches of shoot growth and two cute little flower clusters, the Orange Muscat vines are well on their happy, little, fruit-making journey.  Next weekend they will need to be sulphured, but unfortunately it is forecast to rain, beginning Wednesday, so I don't know how that's going to work. On a more positive note though, rain means no frost, which for the vines means no frost damage.  Of course, being this far along in shoot growth the vines are now producing sugar which acts as a natural anti-freeze.

And that concludes my mini series of the progress of the Orange Muscat budbreak.

Fruit set: Pinot grigio.

With a diameter of about 4 mm, these baby Pinot grigio grapes seem to be really enjoying Napa's favourable, for grape-growing, climatic conditions - definitely over those of 2011.  Fruit set, aided by dry weather during bloom, looks great.  The 2012 vintage looks promising, so far.
Funny, suddenly I feel like a glass of Pinot grigio.

Infanticide.

This is not a bowl of peas, it is some of the first crop of Pinot gris grapes from Vinoland's most recent expansion. Lovely looking berries - nice fruit set, good yield, no powdery mildew - all torn from the caring embrace of their mother vine's canopy and tossed onto the harsh, dry vineyard floor. (I can get a bit dramatic sometimes, forgive me.) It does seem a shame to discard such healthy young grapes, but it a necessary step in the development of new vines where the focus needs to be on encouraging leaf and root growth. Actually, I should have performed this vineyard operation a lot earlier, when the clusters were flowers not fledgling grapes, but as usual I'm a bit behind with stuff. Better late than never!

April (and May) showers bring June grapes.

They are flower clusters no more: there are now actual grape clusters amongst the canopy.

Fruit set looks great, especially in the Syrah vines. The Orange muscat fruit set though is an altogether different matter. It appears that there is a significant amount of shatter in the Orange muscat, which unfortunately means fewer berries at harvest time.

Fools rush in.

What's the hurry?
Pinot grigio has to have the funniest growth habit of any variety of grapevine. Whilst the Syrah and Orange muscat vines will show 2 or 3 inches of growth before you actually see the flower clusters, the Pinot grigio pushes everything out all at once. It’s certianly not backwards in coming forwards. Calm down little vine, calm down!

Survivors.

Yesterday's post was not an early April Fool's Day prank. Nor was it a bad dream to thankfully be awoken from. Those nasty deer really did chomp their way through about one third of what would have been the 2010 vintage of Vinoland's Orange muscat planting.
This is what all the Orange muscat vines should look like; healthy, shiny leaves with baby flower/grape clusters already formed, promising a fairly decent sized crop in September. But no, those ignoble interlopers nipped it in the bud, literally!

What a difference...

...ten days makes. Look at my Orange muscat, isn't it fab? The mid to high 70 degree temps, we have been having, have really helped the vines flourish. You can see two little flower clusters at the apical end of the growth...they will be the two bunches of grapes this cane will produce. I love grapevines.