Vineyard and Wine industry update

I thought it was about time I gave you all an update on the vineyard! We are currently in the last month of winter. We have had a (relatively) good winter so far. We are only approx. 15mm below our long term average rainfall for the year, and things are looking quite good. If this continues for the rest of the year it will be our first average rainfall year in about 5.

The cover crops are starting to grow more rapidly now (and so are the weeds). We are starting to think about when we should be mowing them down, as we want as much organic material as possible produced without using up all of the available soil moisture.

Pruning is beginning to wind up with only Chardonnay and Sauv. Blanc. blocks still to go. We look like getting finished in fairly good time, with the vines already starting to weep when cut (so tying rods down to wire is becoming a more urgent job to do). We have been pruning our vines fairly hard this year due to the severe surplus of wine in the Australian industry. We have pulled vines out (and left area bare), over the last few years. We are not expecting to be able sell all of the grapes we will produce in the upcoming vintage, we are going to limit our yields with heavy pruning (this should also have a positive impact on quality).

Prices we will be paid this year for our grapes will be well below our cost of production, the temptation is to produce more tonnes to offset these low prices, however this will not help the overall industry and if many growers adopt that kind of philosophy the wine industry will remain in the doldrums for a long period of time. Financial viability for grape growers in Australia is going to a major issue over the next few years. Our company requires a 30% lift in grape prices just to break even, if this does not happen in the next 2-3 years we will not be able to survive.

Ten years ago our family business supported 3 families - now it can not even support one (in that time we have expanded the area we farm and improved our mix of grape varieties). We are attempting to value add to our grapes with our label Mad Dog wines, but we have a long way to go before that will make much contribution to our financial bottom line.

Anyway enough doom and gloom, the answer is for everyone to drink up! Cheers!

Mad Dog wines web site

After 4 generations of growing grapes and 10 years of making their own wine under the label of ‘Mad Dog’, Matthew Munzberg director of Mad Dog announced today that Mad Dog wine is now available direct to customers over the Internet. The newly developed web site has a history of Mad Dog, reviews of the wine, an online shop where Australian customers can get Mad Dog wine delivered to their door and a membership area so that people can be kept informed about Mad Dog.

Mad Dog was started by the Munzberg family in 1999. Mad Dog uses only selected grapes grown in the Munzberg families vineyards at Vine Vale in the Barossa Valley. The family vineyards cover approx. 35 hectares of premium Barossa floor area, from which Mad Dog selects the best Shiraz and Sangiovese fruit. ‘We select the best fruit from our vineyard and combine traditional winemaking methods, minimal handling and top notch French oak to produce a Shiraz that is undeniably Barossa, with its rich fruit flavours and ample structure’ Matthew said.

Mad Dog currently produces a flagship Shiraz product (the 2006 vintage is for sale right now) and an exclusive Sangiovese, which comes from a very small 14 year old trial planting that produces small parcels of exceptional wine. The Shiraz comes from several blocks of old vines (some more than 100 years old). ‘Mad Dog plans to introduce several new products in the next few years. So I would advise anyone wanting to hear more to sign up to our Mad Dog club on the web site at http://www.maddogwines.com/’ Matthew said.

Heat wave in Southern Australia

A period of extended extreme heat has hit the southeastern corner of Australia. Nuriootpa here in the Barossa Valley is now into it's 4th consecutive day of more than 40C (104F) temperatures. The maximum on Wed. 28th reached 44.1C (111F). We have another 5 days out of the next 7 forecast to be at or above 40C.

We are already seeing signs of scorching of our grapes, with Riesling being the worst affected variety. We are irrigating continuously at present (each block will be getting a drink about every 4th-5th day), as this is the only thing we can do to help our vines cope with the heat. Sugar levels are climbing and we will be starting harvest this coming Mon. night. We will be harvesting all of our Sauvignon Blanc this coming week and I would expect that some Chardonnay will also be picked next week.

Weather for the month of December 2008

Weather Report Month Ending 31/12/08

Maximum Temperature for the month 32.7C (91F) on Fri. 26th. Average for this month was 24.3C. 6 readings above our long term monthly average of 27.1C.

Minimum Temperature for the month 6.1C (43F) on Tue. 2nd. Average for this month was 12.0C. 16 readings above our long term monthly average of 12.3C.

Rainfall for the month 69.6mm (198.6 points) 9 days of rainfall recorded. Our long term average is 27.7mm spread over 6.4 days.

Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

A very cool month for us with very good rainfall. We went very close to having our wettest December in more than 10 years, only 2004 was wetter with 72.8mm.

This month in the vineyard:

The very cool conditions have meant a very steady start to the season with most phenological stages happening about 1 week behind last year. This puts the vines in a more normal time frame than we have seen for the last few years.

We have now put the last of our Fungicide sprays on and are having to concentrate on the weeds that the brilliant rain we had, has now encouraged to start growing. Crop levels appear to be close to average with some exceptions, Chardonnay appears to have a very good crop, while Shiraz could be down a little on average. The oversupply of grapes in the wine industry will mean that we will not be able to sell all of our grapes and those that we can sell, we will make a loss on, because of the low prices we will be offered by our wineries.

I hope everyone had a pleasant and safe Christmas and New Year.

Weather for the month of November

Weather Report Month Ending 31/11/08

Maximum Temperature for the month 34.7C (94F) on Wed. 12th. Average for this month was 23.8C. 12 readings above our long term monthly average of 24.6C.

Minimum Temperature for the month 3.3C (38F) on Sun. 23rd. Average for this month was 10.3C. 14 readings above our long term monthly average of 10.7C.

Rainfall for the month 28.6mm (82 points) 12 days of rainfall recorded. Our long term average is 35.5mm spread over 7.5 days.

Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

A cool and relatively dry month for us, however we had more rainy days than our average. I am not sure if global warming is a reality or not, but we are certainly not getting the bigger dumps of rain that we used to get. We had 4 more rainy days than is average, however we recorded 7mm less rainfall.

This month in the vineyard:

I have had a very busy month! The vines have now all finished flowering and we now have fruit set. We have been doing estimates for our winery customers - so far it is looking like an average or just below year for the Barossa Valley as far as tonnes of grapes go. It's too early to tell what our quality will be like, however below average yields normally mean higher quality grapes. We have been maintaining our usual spray program for the prevention of Downy and Powdery mildew. I have also had to spread some snail bait to counteract increased numbers of white snails this year.

I have been kept busy with all the usual meetings and seminars that I seem to have to attend. The Barossa Valley Technical group held a very interesting seminar on crop estimation, that included some information on trellis tension as a guide to crop load. We are also now getting into the season of Christmas lunches, drinks etc.

I have now taken over the day to day running of Mad Dog wines. My sister and brother in law were running this however do not feel they can contribute enough time to do it justice. I am organizing to bottle our 2005 Shiraz and I am hoping to have it for sale early in the new year. I am currently looking for outlets here in Australia that would like sell our premium Barossa valley products.

This week 31st October 2008

Weather Report Week Ending 31/10/08

Maximum Temperature for the week 33.6C (92F) on Sat. 5 readings above our monthly average of 20.5C.

Minimum Temperature for the week 7.6C (46F) on Tue. 6 readings above our monthly average of 8.0C.

Rainfall for the Week 2.8mm (8 points) 2 days of rainfall recorded.

Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

Finally a trace of rain for us. No where near enough for us to even go close to calling this a normal month. In fact we only recorded 13.2 mm of rain for the whole month (our average is 44mm). Our maximum temperatures were also very different from average, with the month of October 2.6C above our average.

This week in the vineyard:

As you can see from the photo, our Chardonnay is well into flowering now. I am still spraying weeds, to preserve as much natural moisture as I can. Flowering this year could be approx. 2 weeks earlier than we would normally expect. Not all varieties have started flowering yet, just the early ones like Chardonnay and Pinot Noir. I am planning to start putting our next fungicide spray on later this coming week.

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).

A Post from London

This week I am in the UK. I have spent some time near Cambridge and I am now in London. I am staying at the Farmers club right in the heart of London just across the Thames from the London Eye. I flew in from France last Thursday. I really enjoyed my time in Eastern France and learnt lots about how wine is made in the 'old world', and some of the mystic that is attached to it. The photo is another that I took while I was in France, in the Alsace region.

Back at home in the Barossa Valley it has been a relatively dry week, with only 2.8mm of rain recorded. We have also had 3 frosts (2 of them quite a low -1.4C). I hope these have not done any damage, I have been told that some of our vines were at woolly bud stage and so will be vulnerable to frost from now on.

A Post from Alsace France

I am in Strasbourg, France currently. I spent a couple of days longer in Spain than I was hoping to, due to very heavy flight bookings. I have been in France for 4 days and am really enjoying it, despite not knowing much French. The people are very friendly and try to help any way they can. I am quite glad that I do not need to farm some of the land that they grow grapes on. The vineyards are very steep with very high planting densities. I have seen very few vineyards that could be worked mechanically here, but the small land holdings probably make this impractical anyway. The rules that they also need to comply with would cause me frustration, but they do also provide some stability to their industry that we do not enjoy back home. The photo shows a traditional French village with an ancient fort overlooking it, surrounded by vineyards.

Back in the Barossa Valley it has been drizzly and we have had several frosts. We recorded 11mm of rain for the week over 5 days. I believe we are also seeing the first signs of bud swell.

Post from Spain

Today I am posting from Barcelona in Spain. I have spent most of this week on the Mediterranean coastal region. Grape growing here is very interesting - while the climate is similar to the Barossa Valley, the soils are very different. The stony and chalky type soils produce very low vigour vines. I have visited several wine regions while here, but lack of time will limit me to regions close to Barcelona. Next I am heading to France. The photo is of a typical Spanish vineyard, although this one is a relatively high vigour one. This was taken in the hills above Tarragona.

Back at home it is continuing to rain in small amounts, we have had a total of 14.8mm for the week and recorded some rainfall 6 out 7 days. We have started mowing down our cover crop. This years' cover crop is looking like one of the best we have grown for quite a few years - not a bad result considering it has not had any artificial fertiliser, only the fowl manure we usually put on every second row each year. I think we must be doing something right with our soil!

Another Airport - this time JFK New York

Well this blog comes to you from New York. I am waiting for a flight to the UK, where I will be spending the weekend before flying on to Barcelona to have a look at wine growing in Spain. This week I have spent here in New York and in Maryland, I have been talking to wine promotion people and regional marketing organizations. I am interested in how regions brand, and then market themselves - as I feel the Barossa Valley is not doing as good a job as it could at this. My Nuffield scholarship that I am on at the moment is helping me find out how other regions are doing this and giving me lots of ideas that the Barossa might like to try.
The photo today was taken in Washington state, it is of the entrance to the Red Mountain AVA, a relatively small but, I think up and coming area for premium grapes.
Back at home it continues to rain in small amounts. We have had 20mm for the week, however this was spread over 5 days (useful, but not ideal). Just another piece of news I have from home, this week the Barossa Grape and Wine association appointed a CEO. He is Sam Holmes, and I look forward to meeting him and working with him when I get back home.

Boise, Idaho

I am currently in Boise, Idaho. I have spent most of the last week in the Washington wine growing area. For a relatively young wine growing region, they are making some amazingly good wines. There are also some of the worlds best winemakers working here. So far I have been very fortunate with the weather - everywhere that I have been has been fine and warm but not too hot. This coming week I will be flying to the west coast of the USA. The photo this week is of sunset in Washington state taken near Dayton.

This week at home in the Barossa we have only had 4.4mm of rain for the week. This is only enough to keep things damp, but we do still need some heavy soaking rains before the end of winter.

Flying in China

We are about to get on a domestic flight in China from Guangzhou to Nanjing. As is usual with our group, the flight is delayed, so I have a little time to update my blog. China is a country of contrasts, they are obviously expanding at a furious rate, but at the same time a lot of the farming is being done much like it has been done for hundreds of years. There are very few young farmers in this country - all the young people want to do is move to the cities and get jobs in the many factories here. Farming is considered a very low class occupation, until this attitude changes, I do wonder how China will be able to feed itself. The photo today shows fruit and vegetables for sale in one of the many wet markets we have seen here.

Back home it has been raining this week, not sure how much, looks like around about 10mm. our season is shaping up to be fairly dry - we will need a really wet month soon!

This week 13th June

Good news for the Barossa this week. We have recieved 15.8mm of rain, to keep our vineyard going. We are still well behind our average rainfall for the year, we have only had 95mm so far (our average up till the end of this month is 203mm). I am still hopeful that we will get the very wet winter that we really need.

I am currently in Chartres, France on the Nuffield global focus tour. We have been having an incredible time. Our group of 11 (8 Aussies, 2 Kiwi's and a token Canadian) are all feeling rather tired. We are having to cope with very early mornings and late nights as well as jet lag and long sessions visiting farms and listening to other presentations. I have learnt more about the world dairy industry in the last 2 weeks than I will probably ever be able to use. But it is not just dairy, we have been to pig, sheep, beef, cropping, poultry, thoroughbred horse and seafood farm operations and have had a chance to question the owners/managers of all of them (we have even been to some farms that I think they actually farm tractors, one Irish farm had more than 60). I do not have any photos to show this week, as I haven't had time to download them from my camera.

This week 23rd May 2008

My weather data for this week is incomplete due to the Nuriootpa weather station going down after rainfall last weekend.
We have had just over 40mm of rain in the last week. I am writing this from Sydney airport, on my way out of Australia. I am just about to start my travel as part of my Nuffield scholarship. Today I will be flying to Christchurch in New Zealand. I will try to update you all as I am travelling, and let you know where I am and what I am doing. I will also try to let you know what is happening at home in the vineyard, however I will not be back home for another 16 weeks - so there will be no photos of home and only limited weather data. I am sorry if anyone needs this info but you should be able to access it at weatherzone.com. The photo today shows part of our contract hand pruning gang doing a hand cleanup on some Shiraz vines, on a cool misty morning in the Barossa Valley.

This week: 16th. May 2008

Weather Report Week Ending 16/5/08
Maximum Temperature for the week 22.6C (73F) on Wed. 6 readings above our monthly average of 17.3C.
Minimum Temperature for the week 3.7C (39F) on Mon. 2 readings above our monthly average of 6.5C.
Rainfall for the Week 0.0mm (0 points) 0 days of rainfall recorded.
Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

Another typical week for us here. Reasonably pleasant days with quite cold nights. No rainfall again this week – however there is some in the forecast for us.

This week in the vineyard:
I am finishing up a number of jobs at the moment, as I am leaving to start my Nuffield scholarship this coming Friday. We have started our pruning in earnest this week. I have had a contract pruning machine working during the week and a hand contract gang also started on Thursday. The hand gang will probably be here for the next 2-3 months. The photo shows a young block of Sauv. Blanc. in the front with the neighbours Grenache behind, still holding on to their leaves, although most of the vine leaves have now fallen.

This week: 9th. May 2008

Weather Report Week Ending 9/5/08
Maximum Temperature for the week 21.1C (70F) on Sun. All 7 readings above our monthly average of 17.3C.
Minimum Temperature for the week 5.2C (41F) on Sun. 5 readings above our monthly average of 6.5C.
Rainfall for the Week 1.6mm (5 points) 4 days of rainfall recorded.
Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

Surprisingly warm this week. Very mild stable conditions all week. Just heavy fog and mist in the mornings giving us our rainfall recordings this week.

This week in the vineyard:
The photo shows that our covercrop is now well under way. At this stage it looks very good, however will probably need some more rain on it before too much longer (I am not very concerned about it, yet). We have been removing an old patch of Sauv. Blanc this week, however we are not planning to replant it this spring – it will be left fallow for 12 months. This will give us time to prepare the block a little better for the new planting (as well as giving our winery some time to decide what they would like planted there).
I will be leaving on my Nuffield scholarship in less than 2 weeks now. I have, after some difficulty, finally, applied for my Chinese Visa and after a number of phone calls to the embassy in Canberra, to straighten a few things out; it is now being processed for me. Hopefully my Passport will be back in my hands by the end of this coming week.

This week: 2nd. May 2008

Weather Report Week Ending 2/5/08
Maximum Temperature for the week 17.9C (64F) on Thurs. 1 reading above our monthly average of 17.3C.
Minimum Temperature for the week 4.2C (40F) on Tue. 4 readings above our monthly average of 6.5C.
Rainfall for the Week 33.0mm (94 points) 6 days of rainfall recorded.
Weather data thanks to BOM & Nuriootpa Viticulture Research Centre.

Well I think winter has finally arrived for us. We have recorded some rainfall nearly every day this week , with significant falls recorded on 4 days (more than 5 mm). We also have had much cooler daytime temperatures; in fact we had our coldest daytime maximum in more than 10 years on Sunday (11.1C).

This week in the vineyard:
The rain has been fantastic for us. We are all walking around with big smiles on our faces. I have now got virtually all of our triticale covercrop planted. There are just a couple of young blocks of Sauv. Blanc still left to plant, I am just waiting for them to lose a few more leaves. While I have been seeding I have also been putting out a residual herbicide under our vine rows. This spray is usually done early in spring, but I am going away in a little over 2 weeks for 4 months and so I am trying to minimise the amount of work that needs be done while I am overseas. It will be very interesting to see how well it works towards the other end of the season. The photo this week shows a section of the Barossa ranges just starting to change colour to their winter greens.