Looking back to our last newsletter, the contrast in weather conditions between the vintages could not be more stark. Winter began dry and frosty with a period of 7 days of consecutive hard frosts around minus 3 degrees Celsius, a week of no frost, then a second week of consecutive hard frosts. Bob likes to push the boundaries in all things, so we have a lot of trees and plants that are ‘frost tolerant’ but not ‘frost hardy’…these 2 weeks of frosts killed a lot of trees & shrubs.
Then when the rain came… it bucketed down, so that our winter average was well above normal. Then a severe spring storm left us with no power for 3 nights as trees fell across all of the state. Without power we had no lights, heating, cooking, running water (we use tank water raised by electric pump), internet, Eftpos…
And our new generator failed after 10 minutes!
We had trees down in our garden and trees across our driveway. It felt a bit apocalyptic for a while! Luckily we have 2 chainsaws, so we were both getting good workouts clearing the driveway & fallen trees in the garden…each morning for 3 days in a row, we’d get up to find trees or very large limbs across the driveway. We’d spend the best part of the day clearing the driveway only for the same to happen again overnight…
The overall effect was to delay work in the vineyard for some weeks and it feels like you never quite catch up.
Things brightened up and some normality returned until the last week of November, when a big low pressure system developed over Tasmania and the skies opened… 203 mm of rain in just under 7 days was the heaviest fall of rain in one week since Bob started keeping records in 1989.
Yes, Bob got the tractor bogged but he wasn’t alone!
Now the weather is bright and breezy and we have dodged any disease that can often follow wet weather.
I think it is worth noting that the wild fluctuations in weather have been put down to global warming. I believe that the rise in average temperatures will have the greatest impact on world food security through the disruption of ‘normal’ seasons that farmers rely on to raise crops or any agricultural products. Our frost events this year did not affect our vines but did kill some garden plants. Across South Australia huge damage was done to crops such as canola that failed to set seed.
‘Unseasonal’ weather is here to stay and will become evident at the supermarket checkout in the future.
Flowering is nearly over for Pinot Gris and Pinot Noir and almost all our varieties are well into bloom. This is quite early and yet we have had few particularly warm days. Apparently the nights (minimum temps.) are above average. This sneeks by unnoticed as we sleep. So I expect another early vintage, which is always welcome here in Tas.
We should have some additional Lagrein to go into our Romanesque blend as well as more Viognier to go into our Byzantine blend. We should also have some Carmenere to go into our Mattock blend. These are all from new plantings. Speaking of new plantings… we planted a new block of Spanish and Portuguese varieties as some futureproofing. The varieties were Tempranillo, Tinta Cao, Tinta Barroca, Touriga Nacional and Cinsaut. This should be a very spicy blend!
We’d like to wish you all a peace filled Christmas with family & friends and a happy & healthy 2025.
Cheers
Bob & Rita
