Cooling down into harvest time

Autumn is well and truly with us, and the countdown to harvest began when the first brix (sugar level) analysis was done early in March – chardonnay at 17, sauvignon blanc at 15 for us. A wee way to go until the early 20s, but by the time this column appears, growers across the province will be anxiously awaiting harvest dates and times from their wine companies.

Most vineyard activity at this time of the year takes place at sunrise and sunset. The sun is slow to clear the horizon and there's mistiness in the vineyard on a clear, cool morning. The vine leaves are a dark leathery green that tells us they are coming close to "turning" and there's heavy dew underfoot which soaks shoes and socks.

For growers, the work of spraying, trimming, leaf-plucking and bunch-thinning is well past, and instead there's bird scaring and watching the fruit to ensure botrytis doesn't take hold. Any "bottie" bunches have to be snipped off, tossed in a bin and removed from the vineyard to ensure the infection doesn't spread. Spraying for botrytis is also no longer an option.

One day each week, growers go into their vineyards armed with plastic bags and secateurs to snip sample bunches for brix testing. This early morning task gives us all a taste of early winter, because the temperatures are so low that fingers are soon numb with cold.

Some of us also use a device called a refractometer. This instrument measures a liquid's (in this case grape juice's) refractive index and indicates the brix level. By doing this monitoring in between the weekly wine company testing, growers can hopefully see daily progress as the fruit reaches desired ripeness. Brix isn't the only consideration at testing time – there are optimum PH and acidity levels for the fruit that makes the premium wines.

Our thoughts are turning towards harvest and wine making. This brings us to the processes that went into the creation of one of the most exciting sauvignon blancs we've tried in a while.