Bloom abounds.

Here is Vinoland's Cabernet sauvignon (clone 4) in bloom.  The Syrah vines are at about the same stage/percentage through bloom as the Cab.
All four varieties are flowering at the same time; the Orange muscat, Pinot Grigio, Syrah and Cabernet sauvignon.  I don't think that I have known that to ever happen before.  Are two varieties late?  Are two varieties early?  Only Mother Nature knows.

Bloom: 2020.

This photograph could be from any previous year on Vinsanity.  There is only so much that one can do with a photograph of a grapevine in bloom.  But this is how the Pinot grigio (PG) vines looked today, flowering away to their heart's content.  Cute, eh?  They smell good too.
The Orange muscat vines are at about the same stage as the PG which seems a little bit behind this year.  But, as I always say, Mother Nature is on her own schedule.  Berry maturation will be approximately 100 days from now.  I'm just along for the ride.

Vintage snapshot.

As I had mentioned in an earlier post, flowering is a little retarded this year.  The Orange muscat (OM) vines are usually (in an average year) further through bloom at this stage of the growing season.  And please, do not be alarmed, the OM flower cluster in the photograph is not upside down: it is a mildly curious fact that the OM clusters point upwards until the baby grapes advance to a stage when they cannot defy gravity any longer.
I had had a tiny internal debate, with my slightly schizophrenic self, about whether or not to post a photograph of Vinoland's OM bloom this year.  I mean, one Vitis vinifera flower looks much like another, doesn't it?  But then it occurred to me that even though, at this point, it is impossible to tell what the finished wine from this vintage will be like the vintage is in the flower cluster right at the moment the photograph is taken, so each vintage's image is unique.  The flowers that I photograph are different every year, one cannot see the vintage, but it is there.

What a grey May.

Today, I did a Google search on how to spell the sound one makes when blowing a raspberry, as I hadn't the foggiest.  Luckily, others before me had seemingly pondered the same complex, philosophical question and so I learnt that a cartoonist, Berkeley Breathed (Bloom County), had spelled it thus, "PPTHHPTHPFFTHPPPT."  It doesn't sound quite wet enough, if you ask me, but for wont of a better spelling it is the spelling that I am going to adopt on my blog when I need to convey my especial distaste for something.  So here goes: PPTHHPTHPFFTHPPPT! to the month of May.
I had predicted, earlier in the year, that it was probably going to be a rather short winter.  I was wrong, very wrong, it still feels like winter.  It's been a cool and grey spring.  It has been unusually windy for about three weeks now and this past week the temps have been down in the low 60s.  Then, today, it rained.  Sigh.
However, despite the coolness, we finally have bloom in Vinoland.  I'd guesstimate that the Pinot grigio vines are almost two weeks behind their average bloom date.  Not that Mother Nature works on any particular viticultural-schedule, bloom-time is different every year, but the vines do seem to be particularly tardy this year.  Once again,  PPTHHPTHPFFTHPPPT!!!

California calyptra.

It rained today; heavy at times, but mostly a miserable, stubborn drizzle that lasted all-the-grey-day-long.  And the temperature climbed to a whopping 65° F.   Hmmph!  Not exactly optimum conditions for bloom in the grapevines - which seems to be going quite slowly this year. Come back, California-sunshine.
The number of days that the grapevines are in bloom is dependent upon the weather.  When conditions are favourable bloom can take about 8-10 days, (but it can take as long as two weeks under cool conditions like the Napa Valley is experiencing now).  And, of course, the flower clusters on a grapevine will not all bloom at exactly the same time, so that spreads bloom out a bit.  Still, I think bloom is more protracted this year.  I have also noticed that there are more clusters per shoot and that the clusters seem to be a bit bigger than the past two years.
Do not be alarmed by this picture of detached grape flowers from one cluster of Cabernet Sauvignon at TWWIAGE (and hand-modeled by a coworker).  Although it looks like a lot of dead material; anthers, calyptra, stamens, etc., it is quite normal.  As few as 20 to 30 percent of the flowers on a cluster will develop into berries, most will fall from the cluster during the initial stages of berry growth.  Furthermore, a significant number of flowers will drop from the cluster about 8 to 12 days after full bloom: a stage commonly known as shatter.  Fruit set is not complete until after shatter.  Phew!  It's a jungle out there.  Fruit, set, now!

Bloomin' 'eck!

Yesterday, when I was working in the vineyard, stuffing shoots and suckering trunks, I noticed that bloom is rather advanced in the Cabernet Sauvignon vines.  How did that happen? There didn't seem to be much going just this time last week.  The weather was warm at the beginning of the week, but temps have cooled to the low 70s and it's been a bit windy. Whatever is going on the vines seem to like it.  Carry on buddies!

Bloom is bustin' out all over.

Everything is blooming in Vinoland, except for the Cabernet Sauvignon. But that is not surprising, as the Cabernet Sauvignon is always the last variety to go through bud break and bloom.
The wonderful weather we have been having in the Napa Valley of late is absolutely ideal for bloom. Vitis vinifera generally likes the temperature to be about 85°F during bloom and will quite happily bloom away in the heat - until temperatures reach above 95°F when, like me, the vines get a little toasty.  Temperatures above 95°F can result in bloom, and fruit set, being adversely affected.  The grapevines and I are so sensitive.

I doff my calyptra to you, Pinot grigio.

I noticed last week that the Pinot grigio vines were starting to bloom, just a little bit here and there.  A week later, I am estimating that they are probably about 60% through bloom, (or anthesis).  Just look at those calyptra coming off.
There is a lot going on out in the vineyard right now; flowering, shoot stuffing, suckering, sulphuring, weeding, mowing, etc.  Phew!  The vines are busy, so am I, but I am not too busy to pause and acknowledge that the vines are doing most of the work.  Go buddies!

BBCH.

In biology, the Biologische Bundesanstalt, Bundessortenamt und Chemische Industrie-scale (BBCH-scale) is a system used to identify the phenological growth stages of plants, (and it's quite a mouthful).  A series of BBCH-scales have been developed for a range of crops, including grapevines.  According to the BBCH-scale for grapes, Vinoland's grapes are now at growth stage 6; flowering; code 68; 80% of flowerhoods fallen. Put simply, the Cabernet sauvignon is nearly finished flowering.

The flowering grapevine.

A. J. Winkler says, "To the casual observer the opening of a grape flower may seem to be very different from that of most other flowers, but the difference is not great."
I say, the Syrah vines are having a fine old time; flowers, corolla, pedicel, anther, pistil, filament, nectary and calyptra - the whole bloomin' lot.

Working Hard?

Or hardly working?  The Pinot grigio vines are hard at work blooming right now.  The weather this week has been perfect for bloom, warm, dry and not very windy - should be a good fruit-set. I was working moderately hard at stuffing shoots and suckering the grapevines when I noticed bloom had begun.  Meanwhile, Vinodog 2 was working hard at finding any shady spot in the vineyard where she could comfortably nap, (whilst still keeping an eye on me, of course). Workers, and nappers, of the world unite.  Happy May Day.

Anthesis: 2014.

Today I noticed the onset of anthesis, or bloom, in the Pinot grigio vines - as I spent the entire day suckering, thinning, disbudding (odd word) and stuffing wayward shoots under trellis wires.  Buds, buds everywhere.  This time of year the vines, with their enthusiastic unruliness, tend to push buds out from wherever they can.  Leaf buds, flower buds, axillary buds, adventitious buds, lateral buds, water sprouts, suckers - there is new, succulent vegetative tissue pushing out everywhere.  Adventitious buds are sometimes helpful in replacing lost positions on a grapevine, but generally all this extra growth just serves to divert vigour and productivity from the buds I selected when I was pruning.
Some buds on grapevines can remain dormant indefinitely, but when conditions are just right these latent buds may become active and push out from the older, woody tissue where they have been snoozing.  The mini inflorescence in the photograph was apparently very impatient to do something this spring, as it budded out from this vines trunk, just above the graft union, without any leaves for companionship.  Hope it doesn't get too comfortable because it's coming off tomorrow.  Sorry buddy!

A single short-stemmed grape flower.

Ta-dah!  Of course, there are other flower clusters in the Pinot grigio vines that have a lot more bloom going on (and in the Orange Muscat).  I just thought this lonesome flower looked like it was in a rather jubilant mood and not in the least, well, lonely.
It was overcast and sprinkled for about 30 seconds this morning which, along with the low 70s temps, was a pleasant change to the low 90s we have been having.  A very enjoyable afternoon was spent suckering the Cabernet Sauvignon vines.  But no more rain now, thank you very much, we're flowering.

Liar, liar, pants on fire!

I fibbed.  I said I wasn't going to bore anyone with yet another picture of bloom, but it's just such a fascinating time out in the vineyard that I couldn't help myself.  So, sue me!
Vinoland's Syrah vines are about 10% into bloom, not much I know, but it's a start.  Unfortunately, it rained today.  Not a lot, but three rather heavy cloudburst-like showers which were enough to send the Vinodogs and me running for cover in the barn each time. Vinomaker had just sprayed the vines with sulphur on Wednesday morning, so this rain event was particularly badly timed.
I hope this vintage is not going to be like 2011: a vintage in which Mother Nature roundly reminded the Napa Valley's winegrowers, by way of delivering rainy weather through to the very end of June, just who is boss.  Natural crop control at it's finest?

May flowers 2.

Finally, grape flowers in the Pinot gris - all two of them! I have been checking on a daily basis to see if bloom was ever going to get started this year, only to come away each time disappointed. The weather has been unseasonably cool this spring and sunny days have been in short supply. I have heard reports that in the Carneros AVA Chardonnay vines planted there are only about 10-15% through bloom.

What is surprising to me is that bloom didn't begin in the Orange muscat block first, it usually does, but then it seems that 2011, like 2010, is going to be an unusual growing season. I estimate that bloom in Vinoland is about 2 weeks later than last year.

Great, another shortened growing season in the Tundra!

Shattered.

People unfamiliar with the San Francisco Bay Area's micro-climates find it hard to believe that there is a wide range of diurnal temperatures in the Napa Valley also. A friend, who grows Cabernet sauvignon (Clone 7) up in St. Helena, sent me this photograph last weekend of what he originally thought was a grapevine disease. It turns out that his vineyard, that on any given day can be 5-10 degrees warmer than Vinoland, had just experienced a major hiccup in the transition from flower to berry known as shatter.
Fruit set is the stage of berry development 1 to 3 weeks after bloom when most flowers have fallen and those that remain, about 30-60%, develop into berries. Shatter is the detachment of berries from the cluster at the pedicel base (the dark, necrotic tissue in photograph), after the fruit set stage. It appears that the poor fruit set, in this particular vineyard, was the result of dry conditions and high temperatures at bloom. However, shatter can also be exacerbated by variety (Merlot is particularly susceptible), vine vigour, and disease.
What does all this mean? Well, shatter causes widespread yield losses, which in this instance means a diminished crop from which to make wine at harvest time. The fruit set in Vinoland looks solid so Vinomaker will not be without plenty of grape juice to vinify. But he is mourning the loss of those Clone 7 grapes that fell victim to shatter, especially since the 2009 crop surrendered up the best Cabernet of the vintage.

Bunches of flowers.

The Pinot grigio is almost finished flowering (as is the Orange muscat and the Syrah). The Cabernet sauvignon is a bit of a late bloomer, literally. Our clone 4 is a slow starter and is probably only half way into bloom.
The Pinot grigio fruit set looks good, aided by the fact that the weather has co-operated during bloom, no rain, no high winds. The flowers were left in peace to do their little self-pollinating thing. Vinomaker will be happy that he has plenty of white grapes to play with this vintage.