Home | Wine Vintage | 2006
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2006 HARVEST REPORT From our first vintage in 1988, our winery model was based on accessing grapes from a diverse group of vineyards representing different soils, AVA's, elevations, and microclimates, in other words a diverse group of terroirs. We, however, did not own any of those vineyards. Oregon's land use laws prevents agricultural land (vineyards) from being divided in small plots and sold to various owners (wineries). The Burgundy model of a domaine owning small blocks of many premier or grand crus is not legal in Oregon. Oregon vineyards are owned by independent growers (that do not produce wine) and less frequently, wineries. In order for wineries to make wine from a vineyard they do not own, they contract with the grower for the right to receive grapes from specific blocks in that vineyard. The grapes in that block are then farmed specifically for that winery. Under this arrangement, growers have stable clients and the wineries can access multiple sites and control the way fruit is grown. This arrangement allows the winemaker the control required to farm grapes at a very high quality level. The winemaker can control the pruning, leaf pulling, crop thinning, and harvest timing. The winery then can access fruit from multiple sites and receive top quality fruit without having to own each of those sites. This system is used throughout Oregon and has generally functioned well for both growers and wineries. From 1988 to 2006, we did not own any of the vineyard blocks from which we produced wine. The downside of this arrangement is that a grower could sell or lease their entire vineyard to a new entity and a winery's access to that fruit could terminate. This has occurred to St. Innocent on several occasions. In 1997, O'Connor Vineyard was leased for 10 years to another winery, ending our access after the 1998 vintage. In 2007, Seven Springs and Anden Vineyards were leased to a California negotiant for 15 years, ending our 19 year relationship with those sites. Our contract with White Rose ended after the 2008 harvest. Although access to multiple sites was fundamental to my vision of St. Innocent, I decided several years ago that it was time to look for our own "estate" vineyard. For the past five years, I have been searching for a vineyard site to purchase. In May of 2006, St. Innocent became 'members' in the LLC that owned Zenith Vineyard, formerly called O'Connor Vineyard, returning us to the site that produced many memorable Pinot noirs. The purchase of our new estate vineyard included an agreement to construct a new winery at that location. Our summer and fall has been busy with planning, obtaining financing, getting permits and beginning construction of our new winery and an event facility that the vineyard business would manage. We expect the facility to be completed in time for the 2007 harvest. In 2006 we made our first "estate" wine from Zenith Vineyard Pinot noir. The spring of 2006 was warm with temperatures in June reaching 100 degrees. Bloom was slightly early, about June 19th amidst lovely weather. Fruit set was very good and the large crop would require thinning which occurred in early August. The summer was mostly dry (again) and by mid-September the younger vines were showing signs of water stress. Rains in mid-September gave some relief to the water problems, but the youngest vines were in areas that missed most of the shower activity. The last 10 days of September were warmer than usual, very sunny, and with low humidity. This added to the stress producing significant dehydration, especially in the younger vines. Harvest began in late September with excellent fruit maturity. The flavors and skin tannins had developed nicely, but there were signs of dehydration at many sites. The sugar levels were frequently in excess of 24º brix, mostly caused by the warm temperatures and very dry soil leading to dehydration. To compensate, we added some of the moisture back during the destemming process based on the specific level of dehydration. Shea Vineyard is in a rain shadow of Bald Peak, received the least rain, has very sandy soils and was the most stressed. Seven Springs had a slightly higher crop level and matured after the heat subsided and was relatively unaffected. The harvest was relatively compressed given the excellent weather. We began by picking young vine Pinot noir from Freedom Hill on 9/25. Chardonnay from Anden and Freedom Hill Vineyards were picked on 9/27 and 9/28. The bulk of the Pinot noir was picked in the following three days. We finished with White Rose, Zenith, and Temperance Hill Vineyard Pinot noir on 10/5. The final Pinot blanc from Freedom Hill was picked 10/6, eleven days after picking began. 2006 was a record harvest at 130 tons or about 8400 cases. An additional 10 tons were harvested to produce under the Zenith Vineyard label for the Event Facility. The overall vintage character can be described as rich with forward fruit, sweet and ripe tannins and soft acidity. These wines will be accessible in their youth, pair well with full flavored foods, and have moderate aging potential. Although they will not age as well as wines produced in cooler, higher acid vintages, they will easily develop over 10-12 years. We have a bit more wine to sell in 2008 (when most of the '06's are released). Good quality and good quantity are about as good a report as I can give and 2006 certainly delivered. Thanks, |
