Harvest Prep

Adler Fels Winery, Mayacamas Mountains Harvest Prep Donald picks up the fruit bins from Adler Fels, a small winery at 1500 feet in the Mayacamas Mountains between here and Santa Rosa. We have to hire a bigger truck to make the long, grinding drive back to the winery with the fruit, as our truck simply… Read more »

Still Ripening

2007 Harvest (September 7, 2007)             Still Ripening The grapes are on the late side this year, and our cool nights are not helping. The mornings are often 48 degrees, even though the days may reach 80 degrees. Yet when I see our Demeter Crop Production reports over the last… Read more »

Harvest Season Has Begun

Picking lights across the valley.               Harvest Season Has Begun Like constellations in the night sky, the picking lights are on in the late hours of the night across the valley. Harvest time has begun. I know Chardonnay grapes are best picked cool, and these days many of the… Read more »

Grape Harvest Update

Although delicious, these grapes have at least a couple of weeks of ripening for winemaking. The grapes are within a couple of weeks from harvest now, and we have started checking the sugars every few days. Hot weather pushes them quickly; cool weather slows them down. There is so much not in our control! Cool nights… Read more »

Checking Sugars!

The grapes are ripening and are sweet enough to eat! Our grandson Wesley can attest to that! Wesley likes to carry handfuls of grapes as wewalk through the vines. The dogs like to follow andclean up any “droppage”! Soon Ramon will be gathering small bags to test every few days.  Harvest is perhaps three weeks… Read more »

After the Harvest

Early morning harvest of Lot Natalie 12 for distillation.  Once a fellow lavender grower told me that when people asked him if he would buy their lavender, he replied, Do you really want me to come and cut it back just when it is its most beautiful? Usually the answer was maybe not! But that… Read more »

The Bees are Beginning to Speak!

A native bumble bee visits the lavender this morning. The bees tell us when the lavender is ready to be harvested, and they are beginning to speak!  They notice when the first calyxes open and pollen is available. This is the time that we harvest the lavender to be dried as it will not “shatter”… Read more »

Harvest!

Harvest! Very warm last night, the crickets still singing at 3:30 am!  But the harvest began at dawn with a ton and a half for a small Biodynamic winemaker, Eric Hays of Chateau Davell Boutique Winery of Camino, California. Eric Hays and family Tomorrow is the big day of harvest of the rest of the… Read more »