"Lower yields have often been a portent of a fine harvest”, Adrian Bridge.
As summer holidays draw to an end it is time to think about more imPORTant things like the harvest of 2011.
Our head viticulturalist, Antonio Magalhães, and our head winemaker, David Guimaraens have already spent a week visiting our farms and those of our suppliers to assess when picking should start. This has been a challenging year since the wet month of April that provoked widespread attacks of mildew. Once the mildew had passed by late May, the Douro has been in heat wave; the plant leaves looked autumnal already when I visited over the weekend. The combined effect of these factors, added to the fact that the berries are small this year, means that we are looking at a harvest which will be both early and small.
Yesterday we had some rain at Quinta de Vargellas and the upper parts of the Douro Valley. This was very welcome and will help with the ripening process. Vigilance will be required, but the weather forecast looks good.
We expect to open our modern winery at Quinta de Nogueira on 29th August. Nogueira will handle the grapes coming from our grape supplier partners close to the Spanish border.
We expect to start picking our own grapes on either the 9th or 12th of September which will commence from the planting at the São Xisto vineyard at Vargellas. We expect to start picking our own grapes at Quinta de Terra Feita at Vale de Mendiz on either the 16th or 19th of September.
Although this has been a dry year the small berry size means that we will have plenty of skins and ensure good colour and flavour. Lower yields have often been a portent of a fine harvest. We are at that delicate moment however when just enough rain really helps the process but too much is, well, too much.
Our fingers are crossed and our thoughts optimistic.