Bunch Close

Tomorrow is the first day of July. The Japanese beetles are out. The mosquitoes are terrible this year. The horse flies are still blood thirsty as ever. And the vigorous Marquettes are growing faster than I can pull them into the shape I want them.

I still watch the trains go by every day, whistles blowing deafeningly loud.



Time marches on in the season and now I'm organizing lists of tanks, pumps, mixers, hoses, and gaskets that we will need for 2010 crush. It's coming on us pretty fast. The grapes went from bloom to bunch close before I could even get pictures. Veriason is coming soon... this whole season has just been a flurry of working until I can't stand up - falling into a hard, exhausted sleep at night and then waking up to do it again. Oh, and some crappy fast food in the middle because I can't find the time to get to the grocery store to buy real food or cook dinner anymore. :( That's pretty pathetic. But otherwise, everything is good.

The next step is getting everything in order as far as tanks, presses, pumps, and grape crushing equipment. At the same time, we will be netting the grapes to keep the birds off. August was kinda slow last year and once a week, I'd go out and pick a representative sample of grapes from 3 different types to test sugar, pH and tannins. I think this year I'm going to be collecting ten different samples from 7 different types of grapes to see which ones are ripening the best and hoping that they aren't all ready at the same time.



Along with grapes, the cider is in the back of my mind as well. The late frost nipped almost all the blossoms off our apple trees, so now sourcing apples from other local orchards is in order. Nick has his cider recipe down except for the perilously high alcohol content combined with easy drinkability. It's really delicious, so much it might be dangerous.

We just tried another experimental blend with fresh pressed cherries - gorgeous in color and really smooth, slightly dry too. I'm excited to see what we brew this fall.

Alright, time for me to get back at the vines. It's 70 degrees and sunny out today, perfect weather for wrestling grapevines and looking forward to the cold hard cider waiting for me when I get home tonight.

new year... late june.

I have not updated since the end of last year, which might have left some of you on the edge of your seats like a cliffhanger of a tv series.
Well, like any good tv show, I'm back for another season of beating grapevines into the submission, battling bad bugs, and longingly listening to the trains go by.

I've seen my first Japanese beetle already. We've replanted about 600 vines. I'm caring for about 7 different varieties of grapes that are going to bear this year. It's pretty crazy.
I am happy though because I know more this year than I did last year, and I'm in a -take no prisoners- mode with the grapvines. I used to very gingerly prune them just so, but now that I know that pretty much nothing can kill them, I'm pruning hard, and stringing them up.

We're fighting weeds and fungus like crazy this year thanks to all of the early rains we had. My garden is looking pretty sad as it kept getting pummelled by rain whenever I would try to plant anything. We've only had light fungus pressure thanks to a well timed spray program and things have overall been going rather smoothly.


Now on to the hard part --- the winery.

It's hard to imagine how this whole endeavor is going to take shape. It's so hard to think about all the tons of grapes that will be pulled off the vine soon and need to be made into delicious wine.


Agh! So much work when I think about it. We'll see how it all goes. My camera went swimming while Jason and I were on a fishing trip, but I promise to post pics soon.