This week 24th October 2008

Weather Report Week Ending 24/10/08

Maximum Temperature for the week 32.4C (90F) on Sat. 5 readings above our monthly average of 20.5C.

Minimum Temperature for the week 5.3C (41F) on Mon. 3 readings above our monthly average of 8.0C.

Rainfall for the Week 0.0mm (0 points) 0 days of rainfall recorded.

Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

Yet again no rainfall recorded this week. We had 2 very warm days this week with very low humidity's, around 3% on Friday being the lowest.

This week in the vineyard:

Sorry I do not have a photo this week - I have been out on the tractor as much as I can, getting our cover crop sprayed off. I am doing this to try to preserve as much moisture in our soil as I can. I am a little bit late this year, I suspect there is not a whole lot of moisture left for me to preserve, but hopefully we will still be getting some more rain that can be caught in the profile. The very low humidity's that we recorded this week have also seen us lose a lot of the available moisture we did have there. We have had a small increase in our water allocation this week, we now have 15% available to use out of the Murray River.

This past week I attended a seminar being held by Dr. Fearne (Adelaide's current thinker in residence, just finishing up). He has been looking at how the wine industry in particular can achieve maximum benefit from our value chains. The message I got was that we need to get to know our consumers a lot better, to be able better serve their needs and this will also help our retailers market our wine. Sounds good, but it will need more grape growers to become a lot more involved in the marketing of their wine, something we have not had to do in the past.

This week 17th October 2008

Weather Report Week Ending 16/10/08

Maximum Temperature for the week 30.6C (87F) on Sun. 5 readings above our monthly average of 20.3C.

Minimum Temperature for the week 2.1C (36F) on Tue. 4 readings above our monthly average of 8.0C.

Rainfall for the Week 0.0mm (0 points) 0 days of rainfall recorded.

Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

Another very nice week here in the Barossa Valley a typical spring week. Very dry again with no rainfall recorded.

This week in the vineyard:

As you can see from the photo, our vines are growing rapidly. We have now put the first fungicide spray on for the season. The cover crop is still green and continues to suck moisture out of our profile. I will be spraying this off as soon as I can get to it this coming week. Unfortunately I have a number of meetings and other interruptions that will mean not a lot will get done on the tractor. Some more rain would be very useful in the next few weeks, however the forecast does not look very promising.

Settling in back home.

Sorry I haven't posted for such a long time. I am now well and truly back to earth at home. The vineyard, as you can see from my photo of some Chardonnay, is growing very rapidly, we now have inflorescence's separated and well defined. The winter rainfall so far has been close to average however, it has been coming in relatively small regular showers. This means that everything looks nice and green, however subsoil moisture's are not very high and there has been very little run off for people who rely on dams for irrigation. Even though I don't want to spend a lot of time out spraying my vineyard - I am hoping for a very wet spring.

On a more positive note, I was talking to Louisa Rose (chief winemaker for Yalumba) yesterday, about the last vintage from here in the Barossa. She said that '2008 will produce some of the best wine to come out of this region in a long time'. This echos what I said some time ago on this blog about the near perfect ripening conditions we had this year. So keep an eye out for the 2008 vintage wines that will begin to hit the market soon from the Barossa, both whites and (some wait still) reds. Even varieties like Grenache that was mostly picked during or after the heatwave have produced incredible wines.
At home here the weather has been fine and mild with a couple of quite windy, drying days last week. The official weather station has been down for nearly a week (thanks to vandals), so I do not have rainfall figures - but there has been very little (less than 0.5mm). We did record our warmest September day in more than 10 years last Saturday (27th) of 31.7C (89F).