The 2019 Harvest

During the 2019 growing year we decided to maintain a slightly higher density canopy and so did only a light leaf-thinning in the early season on the side of the rising sun. Then in early August we also did a green harvest to adjust the crop size and to take pressure of the vines after the long warm summer.

The growing year started slowly but was followed by a series of heat waves, a drought and heavy rain in late September although we also enjoyed an almost endless dry summer that led to a very fine harvest. Budburst occurred in early April, which was wetter and colder than normal with a frost alert mid-month and then again in early May causing some localised damage. It then warmed up considerably with glorious weather arriving on the first weekend of June just in time for the flowering. It was then hot and sunny from the end of the month and throughout July when temperatures reached a stifling 40°C on 23rd July followed by 2 days of heavy rain from Friday 26th July. The heatwave did not have a negative impact on the vines as the fruit had only just formed but then came more hot weather in August, which lasted well into September, although with cold nights and early mornings, it was ideal for the development of the fruit.

We commenced harvest at dawn on the 23rd September picking the old vines at Plince and with a large team and were finished by mid-afternoon. We then continued the following morning 24th September with the old vines at Mazeyres, finishing just before the light faded. The next day 26th September we picked all the young vines at both Plince and Mazeyres and so completed the 2019 harvest in just 3 days. In the winery, the fruit was carefully loaded from small baskets onto a first-sorting table and then de-stemmed using our precision CUBE system followed by a berry hand-sorting table and a gentle crushing before arriving in the fermentation tanks by gravity. The average yield was approximately 35hl/h for the older vines although not all of the fruit will go into the Grand Vin and 25hl/h for the younger vines, which will only enter into the second’ wine.