Twin Vines Vineyard Block Update
Some of you may recall that we planted 2 acres of "Bordeaux" varietals in our Twin Vines vineyard block in 2003.
We selected 110R rootstock, chose a mixture of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec and Petit Verdot planted in a ratio determined by averaging the published composition of many "Meritage" (rhymes with the English pronunciation of "heritage", believe it or not) and red Bordeaux wines. We also introduced several clones of each varietal, to see how each would perform in our location.
So this is, in many ways, an experiment. The other experiment we undertook was to train the vines in a head-pruned, "Gobelet" style. This was for a number of reasons, clearly with no trellis there is a reduced planting cost (when you plant a small acreage like this, and fence it, you soon run into inverse economy-of-scale factors as you have just as many rows in your small lot as you might see in a lot several times larger), but mainly we like the look of the gnarly old head-trained vines that can still be seen around these parts.
And so the experiment quicky began to generate results. As it happens, the site we have chosen turns out to be quite vigorous, with the rootstock we have. This, coupled with our planting spacing of 8 feet between rows, 5 feet between plants, has proved problematic. These little blighters very quickly filled all available space with sprawling growth, expecially between the rows, making travel along the rows with equipment impossible. The other issue we encountered is that in the afternoons the wind picks up in the vineyard, and blows directly along the rows. With no real trellis system in place, the only thing holding many of these vines in place was a puny pencil rod, but even on those plants which were tied to a t-stake, the wind was very efficient at ripping through any type of tying tape we tried. The result was that every day during the growing season, we'd be retying vines, fighting the sprawl as we went. It was not very satisfactory.
So, we are now doing what we should have done in the first place. The vines are very healthy, we have seen no hard frosts and the other parameters have been very encouraging. So, we are going to sink steel end-posts on each row and place a cordon wire at about 3 feet off the ground. We are going to go with a unilateral cordon approach, which will make each plant look like an inverted "L". Along the row, we are probably going to go with a slotted line post, that will allow us to place "catch wires" to catch the shoots from our vertical shoot positioning (VSP).
We hope to accomplish several things by doing this:
I do plan on collecting some photos as we place end-posts, string wires and train back the plants, and will post back here as things progress.
Steve Wetherill
Escafeld Vineyards
Jolon, CA
We selected 110R rootstock, chose a mixture of Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc, Malbec and Petit Verdot planted in a ratio determined by averaging the published composition of many "Meritage" (rhymes with the English pronunciation of "heritage", believe it or not) and red Bordeaux wines. We also introduced several clones of each varietal, to see how each would perform in our location.
So this is, in many ways, an experiment. The other experiment we undertook was to train the vines in a head-pruned, "Gobelet" style. This was for a number of reasons, clearly with no trellis there is a reduced planting cost (when you plant a small acreage like this, and fence it, you soon run into inverse economy-of-scale factors as you have just as many rows in your small lot as you might see in a lot several times larger), but mainly we like the look of the gnarly old head-trained vines that can still be seen around these parts.
And so the experiment quicky began to generate results. As it happens, the site we have chosen turns out to be quite vigorous, with the rootstock we have. This, coupled with our planting spacing of 8 feet between rows, 5 feet between plants, has proved problematic. These little blighters very quickly filled all available space with sprawling growth, expecially between the rows, making travel along the rows with equipment impossible. The other issue we encountered is that in the afternoons the wind picks up in the vineyard, and blows directly along the rows. With no real trellis system in place, the only thing holding many of these vines in place was a puny pencil rod, but even on those plants which were tied to a t-stake, the wind was very efficient at ripping through any type of tying tape we tried. The result was that every day during the growing season, we'd be retying vines, fighting the sprawl as we went. It was not very satisfactory.
So, we are now doing what we should have done in the first place. The vines are very healthy, we have seen no hard frosts and the other parameters have been very encouraging. So, we are going to sink steel end-posts on each row and place a cordon wire at about 3 feet off the ground. We are going to go with a unilateral cordon approach, which will make each plant look like an inverted "L". Along the row, we are probably going to go with a slotted line post, that will allow us to place "catch wires" to catch the shoots from our vertical shoot positioning (VSP).
We hope to accomplish several things by doing this:
- The cordon and VSP training will point any vigor upward, primarily. This will get it up off the vineyard floor and make it much easier to do routine vineyard chores.
- By having a trellis in place, we will tie each vine to a training stake and to the cordon wire (the fruiting wire). This will give each plant much more stability in windy conditions.
- Having the inverted "L" shape face away from the wind will also help with breezy afternoon conditions.
- Additionally, we will take the opportunity to raise our drip wire up to 16-20 inches (it's probably at around 8 inches at the moment) which will afford much better access to the area beneath the drip wires for routine hoeing and other maintenance. Of course this will also raise the drip hose out of the range of all but giant squirrels and rabbits.
I do plan on collecting some photos as we place end-posts, string wires and train back the plants, and will post back here as things progress.
Steve Wetherill
Escafeld Vineyards
Jolon, CA
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