The Federalist.

I love chili con carne, my own, homemade chili con carne that is.  And I love chili paired with a nice Zinfandel, however, California summer evenings are just too hot to indulge in a big plate of spicy, steaming hot chili (served over rice).  So between the months of May and September/October I simply don't make it, much to the vexation of Vinomaker.  We just recently enjoyed our last, cooler-spring-evening chili paired with a really nice Zinfandel that Thud had sent to me a couple of months back. 
The Federalist, 2010, Dry Creek Valley Zinfandel was everything I like in a well made wine of this particular grape variety; pepper, red currant, plum and raspberry, yum!  Produced by The Terlato Wine Group (a company with an extensive wine portfolio which includes vineyard ownership and management, wine importing/exporting and many international winery collaborations), The Federalist hails from Dry Creek Valley in Sonoma County.  The Dry Creek AVA has come to be recognised as perhaps the premier viticultural area in the state for producing Zinfandel.  Zinfandel is considered the unofficial state grape of California.
And besides, I love the label.  Alexander Hamilton was an interesting man; born out of wedlock, he was a patriot, legal scholar, fiscal conservative and a defender of the Constitution of the United States.  All was going well for Hamilton until his career and reputation were derailed by his complicity in an 18th century sex scandal.  And then, to top it all off, he was mortally wounded in a duel with Aaron Burr, a political rival.  Wow, what a life!  Spicy stuff, just like this wine.

Go wild in the country.

More unintended vegetative activity in Vinoland.  Several, 3 to 4 foot tall, sunflowers are growing here and there around the vineyard, surely the handywork of some mysterious, green-fingered, flower-loving horticulturist of the feathered variety.  The local population of nuthatches and titmice seem to be very fond of sunflower seeds, so I'm inclined to suspect that one, or both, of these frequent visitors to Vinoland's bird feeders are the culprits.
Vinomaker has humoured me and has mowed around the sunflowers for a few weeks now.  Thanks Vinomaker, they look so cheery.

And life goes on.

In amongst a large pile of chipped up grapevine cuttings, the manifestation of new, joyously unrestrained life appears in the form of dozens of tiny, self-rooted Syrah, or possibly Cabernet Sauvignon, vines.  Life does indeed go on.

Vinodog 1.

“I have sometimes thought of the final cause of dogs having such short lives and I am quite satisfied it is in compassion to the human race; for if we suffer so much in losing a dog after an acquaintance of ten or twelve years, what would it be if they were to live double that time? The misery of keeping a dog is his dying so soon. But, to be sure, if he lived for fifty years and then died, what would become of me?”
Sir Walter Scott.

Vinomaker greeted me as I arrived home from work today with the news that V1 had died in her sleep.  What a wonderful way to pass on,  I just wish I'd been with her.  She was a great dog. 
Godspeed Mya.

Head Trained.

Despite a busy day at TWWIAGE (and toasty mid 90s temps), a quick detour on the way home took me over to Napa Valley College Estate Winery where the VWT Department was holding it's 2014 May Fair.  The annual event is a showcase for the release of wines that the oenology students have produced.  It is always fun to taste the latest batch of wines made from the vines in the college's student vineyard.  But most importantly, this year's May Fair was a chance for me, and Vinomaker, to say good bye, and thank you, to Dr. Stephen Krebs.  Happy retirement Dr. Krebs.

The Onion.

Having exhausted documenting almost all of the blue coloured wildflowers in Vinoland (although, I still have one up my sleeve), I have had to resort to photographing whatever is currently flowering.  And even that has been a bit difficult with the unusually breezy weather lately, but let me present to you this little, long-stalked cutey, the white onion (Allium neopolitanum).
A little bit of rain here and there (which includes an unexpected, unforecasted heavy shower today), and lashings of sunshine, has resulted in quite a variety of wildflowers blooming in Vinoland this spring.  Besides the white onion, there are plenty of wild hyacinth and blue-eyed grass in flower right now in an area of Vinoland that I won't let Vinomaker mow, for the time being, and it's driving him crazy.  Oh well.  Bloom on little onion.

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!

Afternoon in the Vineyards: 2014.

The 14th annual 'Afternoon in the Vineyards' was held today, so Vinomaker and I put on some sensible vineyard-boots and headed over to the Carneros American Viticultural Area.  The closest vineyard, on the list of six from which to choose, was that of Pine Ridge Vineyards - their Carneros Collines vineyard on Buhman Avenue.
Pine Ridge grow Chardonnay and Merlot at this location and both varietal wines were available for tasting, so we did (Vinomaker even went back for seconds).  It's a nice vineyard.  Viticultural experts who work for the Napa Valley Grapegrowers, a co-sponsor of the event, were on hand to answer any questions visitors may have had.  The bottom, level half of the vineyard had originally been planted to Merlot and had been grafted over to Chardonnay clones 76, 95 and 96 within the last 2 years (I would guess). 
The old Merlot trunks were quite old and gnarly.  There were lots of questions from the attendees about these not-so-normal looking grapevines; How does one go about attaching the bud?  And how does one end up with the two arms of a bi-lateral cordon?  It was fun to stand in the sun, with my 2 ounces of Merlot, and just listen to the conversations.  Vinomaker and I didn't stay for too long, after all, I had things to do in my own vineyard.  It's always a fun event.

Sign language.

In December of 2011 Coombsville became the Napa Valley's sixteenth American Viticultural Area (AVA).  Just recently a large oval sign, a familiar sight in all fifteen other AVAs, was erected against a fence on the corner of the Rocca Family's Collinetta Vineyard on Coombsville Road.  So it's all official now.
Situated a little above the level of the road, I must have driven past the sign at least half a dozen times, but hadn't noticed it (whizzing past with groceries desperately in need of refrigeration) - until I was told to look for it by a friend.  In my defense I am usually looking at the vineyard on the south side of the road, but now that I know where the sign is my attention is drawn to it each time I pass by.  I like it.

Shoots galore!

When a winemaker/grower friend recently asked me if I had ever seen both the primary and secondary shoots push on a grapevine I answered, "Yes.  And even the tertiary bud occasionally".  She seemed a little concerned that something was amiss in her vineyard as she hadn't really witnessed this phenomenon before.  I, on the other hand, deal with this vegetative-merrymaking every year in Vinoland and have, in the past, simply attributed it to the over exuberance of certain vines.  One such Cabernet sauvignon vine, sporting all three shoots, posed for the above photograph.  But it did get me thinking.
After a quick shufty through all of my viticulture books with no satisfactory findings, I turned to the internet - not much joy there either I'm afraid.  The conventional wisdom online is that the main reason for a secondary shoot pushing is the death or removal of the primary shoot.  Call me old fashioned, but I think the primary shoot in the photograph looks very much alive.  The second reason is perhaps that the vine has suffered a severe pruning.  Nope, I prune the same every year - 2 eight-bud canes and 2 two-bud spurs (5' by 7' spacing) which, in my opinion, is not that severe.  The third reason given is boron deficiency.  Ha!  Coombsville is known for boron toxicity: a neighbour of mine even trucks in water for their vineyard because their boron-rich well water would kill their vines. 
Not being happy with any of my findings, my last resort was to email Dr. Stephen Krebs, my VWT professor at NVC (who, I just found, out is retiring this summer and I am just devastated by the news).  If there is one, ultimate viticultural-brain to pick then Dr. Krebs is in possession of it.  And he said; 
"As for the multiple-bud push, the only explanation that makes sense, of the ones you listed, is severe pruning (which translates to “over exuberance”). If you combine that with a lot of soil moisture and warm, sunny conditions at bud break, I think you get many doubles and even triples."
And there you have it, at least I am satisfied with that explanation.  The climatic conditions at budbreak were such that all of Vinoland's vines were invested with a natural exuberance - which translates as a lot of suckering and thinning in Vinogirl's near future.  I love vines.

Good neighbours?

 

It's not the greatest photograph, but look closely - deer damage.  Now normally I would be sympathetic towards the vineyard owner whose vines had suffered such damage.  I have had unwanted deer in Vinoland, most recently when a neighbours falling tree peeled up the deer fence and a couple of deer took advantage of the situation.  This time, however, I don't feel sympathetic at all.

To cut a long story short - a young deer has been trapped for at least 8 days in a neighbourhood vineyard.  And for most of that time, the unfortunate deer has been wandering around with a broken lower jaw, an injury undoubtedly sustained as it has tried, in vain, to jump over the fencing to freedom.  (When I first saw the deer, more than a week ago, it only had a bloody forehead.  It is unlikely that this deer will survive it's injuries.)  Several phone calls here and there, i.e. vineyard management company, winery, but as of 6 pm last night the deer was still captive.  I did not see the poor little mite today.  I am disgusted.

Deer fences are meant to keep deer out, not in.  Eight days locked inside a vineyard seems very cruel to me.  This (unnamed) winery definitely has enough resources at their disposal that they could have made this situation good as early as last Monday, but no.  They have felt it necessary to inflict ongoing, needless suffering on one of God's good creatures.  Add to that extremely poor neighbour relations and a distinct disregard for the stewardship of the land.  I certainly won't be buying their wine ever again.

Happy St. George's Day, 2014.

 "There is a forgotten, nay almost forbidden word, which means more to me than any other.  That word is England."  Sir Winston Curchill.
Happy St. George's Day to my family, friends and anyone who loves England as much as I do.

Happy Easter, 2014.

V2 is all ears today, as she heard there are a lot of Cadbury Creme Eggs knocking about Vinoland.  V2 is a quick little dog, but not quick enough to get between me and my Creme Eggs.
Happy Easter to all.
Eat chocolate!

A little Easter Saturday salsify.

Every spring, in amongst Vinoland's landscaping (such as it is), up pops one, or two, Common salsify (Tragopogon porrifolius) plants.  Whereas I'd normally weed out other interlopers (such as vetch, burclover or bittercress), I have come to recognise this rather alien-looking, Mediterranean-native biennial when it is young, so I leave it be.  Salsify, with it's tap root that is cultivated as a culinary vegetable (reportedly tasting mildly like an oyster), has a solitary purple flower that opens in the morning and tracks the progress of the sun until it closes up at around midday - which is the reason why I couldn't get a photograph of this flower yesterday afternoon because, by the time I got my camera, it was already done for the day.
When salsify goes to seed the fruiting head resembles that of a dandelion with a large, fuzzy ball of seeds that disperse on the wind.  This efficient dispersal of seed accounts for the success of salsify's reappearance, and rebirth, every spring.  Appropriate for Easter methinks.

Mr. Beakly.

I am sad.  This spring all the usual feathered-suspects have returned to Vinoland (some never left); Mr and Mrs Brown-headed cowbird, a mélange of assorted sparrows, a veritable throng of titmice, the ever quarrelsome scrub jays...chestnut-backed chickadees, white-breasted nuthatches, mourning doves, quail, bluebirds, finches and towhees - to name but a few.  All these tweeting, hopping and fluttering visitors stop by our deck, several times a day, to grab a snack from the seed-smorgasbord that Vinomaker puts out for them.  Ever present are the dark-eyed juncos (Junco hyemalis), a small bird widely distributed in the United States usually having a pinkish bill, dark ashy-grey head and conspicuous white lateral tail feathers that they flash in flight.  But three particular juncos of note have routinely come and gone for the past few years.  Until this year.
First, there is 'Necklace' - a junco with a very exaggerated ring of light-coloured feathers, akin to a mayoral chain of office, on his chest.  Then there is 'Spectacles' - a dapper little fellow with a pronounced ring of lightly pigmented feathers around each eye, just like he is wearing a pair of reading glasses.  And last, but not least, my favourite, 'Mr. Beakly' - a curious little birdie with muddled pigmentation on his chest and a Mallen Streak on his head.  But most notable of Mr. Beakly's somatic-anomalies is his malformed beak (a junco's beak should be almost finch-like).  And it seems like his beak is continually growing because when last I saw him his lower mandible seemed even larger than usual.  My little mutant isn't at all shy and lets me get quite close to him as he scoffs up seeds with a peculiar sideways action.  I just think he's great.   Alas, I have eagerly awaited his reappearance for the past few weeks now, but to no avail. 
Who knows how old Mr. Beakly was when I first noticed him: unfortunately, nature may have just simply run it's course and Mr. B is now swapping seed-plundering stories and perfectly pigmented wing feathers with avian-angels.  I just miss my little twitterer.

Wine stewardship.

If each of us had a crystal ball life would be so simple.  And predictable.  Without a crystal ball, one thing that isn't predictable is at what age is the best age to drink a favourite wine one may have been saving for a special occasion.  A crystal ball would allow one to drink all wine at it's peak, not too late and not too soon either. 

Today, I was reminded of my crystal ball/wine theory when a co-worker at TWWIAGE read me an email that she had just received.  The gist of the email was this: a man and his wife had recently opened a bottle of TWWIAGE wine for their anniversary.  They had owned the wine for at least ten years.  The wine was "spoiled" and they were very disappointed.  In the interests of good consumer relations, they expected TWWIAGE to make the unhappy situation good by sending them a replacement, gratis, as they were sure that the winery would want them to enjoy TWWIAGE wine at it's most palatable.  And by the way, they had poured the wine down the drain and thrown the bottle away.

On hearing this my first reaction was, well, disbelief.  It took me a little while to process the absurdity of the situation.  What a cheeky request.  What if this was a scam?  What if this gentleman sent a similar email to 300 Napa Valley wineries and just 10% of those wineries took the bait and sent him a free bottle of wine for fear of getting a bad 'Yelp' review, or something.  The whole thing smacked of extortion.

If, on the other hand, the email was legitimate it raised the question: is the wine-drinking public justified in having the expectation that any bottle of wine is guaranteed by a winery indefinitely?  To what extent is the consumer responsible for the spoilage of a long cellared bottle of wine?  I've racked my brain, but I can't think of any other perishable food item that is guaranteed for life.

A reply email was sent from TWWIAGE apologising for the disappointment caused; inquiring as to what vintage the wine had been, where had it been purchased, but regretfully declining, in the nicest possible way, without the option of the winery being able to do a chemical analysis on the dregs, the expectation that the wine was going to be replaced.  Of course, Mr. Cheeky emailed back to say he was astounded that a winery with such a high reputation wouldn't replace his bottle of wine - a bottle that he couldn't prove existed in the first place.  Brazen to the last.

I can, however, guarantee that the wine with the grotty cork, in the above photograph, is past it's best.  And I decided that without the benefit of a crystal ball.  Easy peasy.

A pretty bloom.

Once again, just when I thought I had uncovered every last blue (and purple) wildflower in Vinoland I have found another.  I think I have mentioned it numerous times before that blue (and purple) flowering plants are my favourites and I find them all as enchanting as one another, so it made me really happy to find this little blossom.
Identifying this particular wildflower turned out to be a little difficult.  Of course it is obviously very iris-like, but the two most common native Californian irises that I identified, in a couple of native plant guides I possess in my smallish reference library, happen to be the Douglas Iris (Iris douglasiana) and the Western Blueflag Iris (Iris missouriensis).  Neither of these irises are really considered to be wild flowers as often they have simply just escaped cultivation.  So I turned to the internet to do some further research and I am 99% sure that my, quite diminutive, iris is the Bowltube Iris (Iris macrosiphon).  Found on slopes and in woodlands, the flowering stalk on the bowltube is much shorter (and stalk-less) than the attending leaves, a feature which distinguishes this iris from the aforementioned two.  The iris in the photograph is rather close to the ground, it's leaves being more than twice it's height.
One interesting snippet of information about this iris is that it was a source of fibre for Native Americans who harvested the leaves to produce cordage that they used to make bird nets, fish nets, deer snares and other useful items.  I am not going to be ripping the foliage from this agreeable little flower any time soon, as I want it to reappear next year (and I think it may be the only one of it's kind in Vinoland).  So flower on little weed.

Spray day.

Today, at last, and for the next 5 day extended weather outlook, there is no rain in the forecast.  So, and not a moment too soon, the vines received their first application of sulphur for the season.  I was starting to get a bit worried about the Orange muscat vines which have a good 10-12 inches of growth already - they should have had two, preventative sulphur treatments (to ward off powdery mildew infection) by now, but the weather has not been cooperating.  Ho hum.

Grape Pearls.

Grape pearls, or sap balls, are tiny sap-filled droplets that are exuded from surface cells of rapidly growing grapevines.  Often mistaken for insect eggs, which is what I thought they were when I first saw them, grape pearls are a curiosity (to me at least) found on grapevine shoots, and the underside of leaves, in the spring only.  In fact, I had to look under several leaves before I found a node displaying these slightly opaque sap balls: they were much more evident a week or so ago, but I was too busy elsewhere to stop and take a photograph. 
The technical name for this phenomenon is guttation.  Grapevines experiencing rapid spring growth can exhibit guttation under high moisture conditions - diffusion pressure builds inside the plant because of high soil moisture and a low rate of transpiration due to high humidity.  The built up pressure is released by exuding water and minerals from specialised cells...voila, grape pearls.  Apparently, pearls occur on some grape varieties more than others, which probably explains why I have seen then mainly on the Orange muscat vines.

My Cab's here.

It's a good job my livelihood isn't dependent on me predicting things correctly.  Four or five days until budbreak, indeed!  Today I noticed that the Cabernet Sauvignon vines are experiencing budbreak - albeit sporadic - but budbreak it is.  Infact, there are quite a few adventitious buds that have developed on the vine's trunks that have already unfurled into rosy-pink, baby leaves.  Go little buddies!